David Nowakowsy was choirmaster and composer-in-residence of the Brody Synagogue in Odessa from 1861 until his death sixty years later. For over 53 years he composed a new work almost every week. While his greatest output consisted of elaborate choral works for Cantor and choir, he also wrote secular music for string trio, oratorios, violin sonatas, German and Russian Lied, totaling over 2,000 works.
After Nowakowsky's death in 1921, the Bolsheviks seized Odessa's Brody Synagogue. His music was then smuggled out to his Grandaughter: Sofie, an emerging concert pianist then living in Berlin. Sofie and her family became stateless refugees in 1937. In 1939 they obtained Romainian passports which allowed them to settle in a tiny French village on the Swiss border called: Collonges-sous-Saleve, just 3 kilometres outside of Geneva. After the Nazis took control of so-called "Free France" Sofie and her family smuggled themselves into Switzerland. The last to escape the Nazis was Sofie's husband: Boris, who buried Nowakowsky's music on Chosal's farm in the neighbouring French village of Archamps.
Boris returned to Chosal's farm after the war and retrieved the music. It was not until the mid '50's that the manuscripts were taken to New York by Boris' Son Alexandre and given to Hebrew Union College to be examined and edited by Dr. Max Helfman. When Helfman died in 1963 only seven of the 2,000 works were edited. They were placed in storage and nearly destroyed again, when a small trash fire broke out in 1978 in the Colleges' basement.
Cantor David Lefkowitz undertook the task of editing the music in 1979. The first performance in 75 years was given ten years later in California by the Roger Wagner Chorale and Orchestra at Royce Hall, with Lefkowitz as the featured performer and Roger Wagner conducting. Sadly this concert is not commercially available. In 2006 Ron Graner obtained a grant from the Bravofact Foundation to produce a short video depicting Boris' hiding of the manuscripts at Chosal's Farm and his return after 1945. Concert-Master of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Mark Skazinetsky and acclaimed cellist David Hetherington and Elizabeth Kreuger on organ and piano accompany Cantor Graner on this award-winning video.
The video, courtesy of the Bravo Fact Foundation, is loosely based on Boris' account. A more detailed narrative was recorded by Ron Graner for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in 2006 and is included in a DVD package that includes a concert (1994) featuring Nowakowsky's music. the full audio interview with Nowakowsky's Great-Grandson, (1995) and the 2006 BravoFact "short". The concert was recorded in The Cathedral of St. Catherine in St. Catharines Ontario and features an eight voice choir, vocal soli, violin, cello, organ and piano. This DVD package is available for purchase from Lost Music Productions (2245491 Ontario Inc.) The 13-minute CBC Radio documentary can be downloaded on this site without charge. The 1995 concert/interview package contains complete works, while the radio documentary contains only excerpts of the full interview and of the music.
David Nowakowsky 1848-1921
A music-theatre play entitled: "MUSICAL PAWNS" will be presented in February 2012 at the FRIGID Theater Festival in New York. A longer version of the play will be performed in Toronto July 4th-14th at the Toronto FRINGE (c) Festival. The play mixes fact and fantasy, humour and pathos, in an attempt to bring Nowakowsky's music, -and the almost 100 year-long oddysey of the manuscripts to life.
Scenes from Mucical Pawns New York Fringe Theatre 2012
Cast | - Producer- Ron Graner
- Director- linidi g.papoff, David Hirsch
- Muisc director- Merideth Zwicker and Bud Roach
- Choreography- Sean Hauk
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- Bud Roach
- Emmanuelle Zeesman
- Graham Robinson
- Margaret bardos
- Meredith Zwicker
| Mike LepockRoimna CortinaSean HaukToni Macrae |