Page 49 - Weiss, Jernej, ur./ed. 2026 Skladateljska društva nekoč in danes.../Composers’ Societies Past and Present...

Weiss, Jernej, ur. 2026. Skladateljska društva nekoč in danes: preplet stanovskega in nacionalnega | Composers’ Societies Past and Present: Combining the Professional and the National
Koper/Ljubljana: Založba Univerze na Primorskem in Festival Ljubljana. https://doi.org/10.26493/978-961-293-555-9.49-58
© 2026 Lubomír Spurný

Music in Terezín: Cultural Continuity
in Extreme Conditions

Lubomír Spurný
Masarykova univerza, Brno
Masaryk University Brno

Professional Practice Under Duress
For more than three-quarters of a century, the artistic life of the Theresien-
stadt (Terezín) ghetto has raised profound questions. Originally conceived
by the Nazis as a model community for middle-class Jews, it first received
deportees from the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, Austria, Germa-
ny, the Netherlands, and Denmark. Later, Jews from Slovakia and Hunga-
1
ry were also interned here. A unique combination of town ghetto, concen-
tration camp, and transit camp, Terezín was, for a variety of reasons, also a
place where artists were permitted – and in some cases even encouraged –
to continue their creative work. Beyond their shared Jewish origin and the

1 The ghetto was established in late 1941 and liberated by the Red Army on May 8,
1945. The Theresienstadt ghetto was originally a fortress complex, founded in the
second half of the 18 century. It consisted of the so-called Small Fortress (serving
th
as a military and political prison) and the Great Fortress (also called the Main For-
tress), which included the town of Terezín. During the war, 140,000 people passed
through Terezín, 90,000 of whom were sent further east to extermination camps. At
the end of the war, 6,875 Jews from the Protectorate and about 240 from the territo-
ry of the occupied Czechoslovak borderlands – the so-called Sudetenland – survived
in Theresienstadt/Terezín.

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