"Joseph Roth — Coming BAck," documentary by Oksana Lyniv
Oksana Lyniv, the internationally known conductor and artistic director of the LvivMozArt festival, tells the stories of Joseph Roth and Leonard Bernstein and his parents in a documentary that also features a commemorative concert near the ruins of Brody Synagogue in western Ukraine.
Roth was a renowned Austrian-Ukrainian writer and journalist of Jewish origin from Brody. The parents of Bernstein, the famed American composer and conductor, hailed from nearby Rivne.
In 2019, the International Classical Music Festival "LvivMozArt" commemorated Joseph Roth’s double anniversary — 125 years after his birth and 80 years after his death. For the first time, a commemorative concert took place in the writer’s Galician homeland, near the ruins of Brody Synagogue.
The building, one of the largest Jewish temples in Eastern Europe, was partially ruined during World War Two. A living witness to tragic events, it was the backdrop for Bernstein’s Symphony No. 3, “Kaddish,” which involved more than 200 artists and star soloists from around the world.
Soloists: Pumeza Matshikiza (Republic of South Africa)
Narrator: Sunnyi Melles (Switzerland)
The ˮDudarykˮ Lviv State Academic Male Choir (Ukraine)
"INSO-Lviv" Symphony Orchestra (Ukraine)
Conductor: Oksana Lyniv (Ukraine-Austria)
Related: Memorial Concert Commemorating Babyn Yar
A memorial concert dedicated to the 75th anniversary of Babyn Yar was held at the Kyiv Opera House on 26 September 2016. Engaging artists from all over the world, the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra performed Max Bruch’s “Kol Nidrei,” a form of Jewish prayer, the “Kaddish-Requiem” by Yevhen Stankovych, based on the poems of Dmytro Pavlychko and “A German Requiem” by Johannes Brahms.
Participating in the concert were the renowned Ukrainian Dumka Chorus and operatic stars Gal James of Israel, Canada’s Benjamin Butterfield and Pavlo Hunka of England. The concert also featured Canada’s Roman Borys and the remarkable Ukrainian conductor Oksana Lyniv, who works with the Bavarian State Opera. The concert was staged by opera director Annechien Koerselman of the Netherlands.
The concert was sponsored by the Ukrainian Jewish Encounter as part of a series of four separate events the organization held in Kyiv from 23-29 September 2016 commemorating the anniversary. The other events included a student conference, a public symposium and an international landscape design competition to create a memorial park at Babyn Yar.
We reproduce this concert in honor of the 79th anniversary of Babyn Yar.
