At 5 PM Saturday May 28 (rain date May 29), the acclaimed Varshavski-Shapiro piano duo rejoins descendants of the show’s main characters to present the first open-air performance of Two Pianos: Playing for Life at the Untermyer Gardens Amphitheater, a walled garden symbolizing earthly paradise. This moving multi-media concert narration recreates the story and performances of two female Jewish pianists – Anna (Burstein) Bieler-Suwalski and Halina (Neuman) Schulsinger – who played for Jewish-only audiences in Nazi Germany under the umbrella of the little-known Jewish Culture League (Judischer Kulturbund), which provided thousands of dismissed performers employment during that dark era.
Two Pianos has been performed to standing ovations in Philadelphia PA, Leipzig Germany and Rutgers-Newark NJ, with each performance highlighting the characters’ links to these venues. This performance connects the story to progressive reform lawyer Samuel Untermyer and his 1933 call for a global boycott of the Nazi Third Reich during dedication of the Minnie Untermyer amphitheater at Hebrew University in Jerusalem.
This cultural event showcases the power of music – and the decent acts of good people — to defy despair and cultural exclusion. With human rights under brutal attack here, in Ukraine, and around the world, it continues to resonate.
Two Pianos: Playing for Life will kick off the Garden’s 2022 Minnie Untermyer Concert Series. The performance is the first-ever two-piano event at the Gardens. It will feature Steinway grand pianos on the Amphitheater stage’s mosaic floor, large video screens, and advanced audio to complement this magnificent setting.
Pianists Stanislavka Varshavski, born in Kharkiv Ukraine, and Diana Shapiro, born in Moscow, voice the words of Anna and Halina (recorded in the 1980s) and perform classical music by Arensky, Mozart, Rachmaninov and other composers. Kenneth Hoffman (Halina’s grandson) and author/producers Nora Jean and Michael H. Levin (Anna’s daughter and son-in-law), narrate and provide historical context.
The backstory, says Nora Jean Levin, includes this: “My parents emigrated to America from Germany through Palestine with my older sister in 1936-38. When my mother died in 2003, among our inherited possessions we found not only reviews of her 1934 and 1936 Kulturbund concerts with Halina, but family photographs which linked my Aunt Rebecca and grandfather Jacob Burstein to the Hebrew University Amphitheater on Mount Scopus funded by Untermyer in his late wife’s memory.”
“In 1978 after my parents returned from their first trip back to Leipzig, we began to record, research, retrieve, and try to fully understand their vanished lives. In 2015 we went to Jerusalem to find that stage. Then a random web search led us to the Untermyer Gardens website, and to Steve Byrns, the Conservancy’s founding President.
Adds Stephen Byrns: “We are thrilled to present this performance, which resonates more than ever in our world. To have two grand pianos in our magnificent garden setting will be a rare treat, and a spectacular way to highlight the rich Jewish history of Samuel Untermyer.”
After Two Pianos premiered in 2018, the Levins along with Dr. Hoffman formed an arts/education company, Papers Please Inc., to bring it and their other discoveries to wider audiences. This summer their second nonfiction volume — Firebird: The Musical Life and Times of Rebecca Burstein-Arber – will be published under the Papers Please umbrella. See www.twopianosplayingforlife.org
Musical Program: Stravinsky, “Petroushka Dance” (arr. Varshavski-Shapiro); Arensky, Suite No. 1 for Two Pianos, “Waltz”; Mozart, D Major Sonata for Two Pianos, “1st Movement”; Rachmaninov, Suite No. 2 for Two Pianos, “Romance” and “Tarentella”; Chopin, F Minor Mazurka, Op. 63; Witold Lutoslawski, “Variations on a Theme by Paganini”
Untermyer Gardens is located at 945 N. Broadway in Yonkers. Seating is limited. Tickets are $50 and available for purchase online at
https://www.untermyergardens.org/store/p521/Two_Pianos_-_Playing_for_Life.html
