Can Heaven be Void?

Look back in pain – Horror in artistic expression.
The horrific life story of Dr. Baruch Milch has been formed in a cantata composed by his daughter Ella Milch-Sheriff.

for Mezzo-Soprano, Narrator and Orchestra

General

Based on the book by Dr. Baruch Milch "Can Heaven be void"
Music: Ella Milch-Sheriff
Edited by: Dr. Shosh Milch-Avigal
And parts of Paul Celan poem "Engfuerung"
Libretto edited by: Dr. Shosh Milch-Avigal and Ella Milch-Sheriff
English Translation: Helen kay, Sally Whyte
Publisher: C. F. Peters Frankfurt

Instrumentation

The Milch home, Podhajce

• 2 Flutes (piccolo)
• 2 Oboes (English Horn)
• 2 Clarinets in B flat
• 2 bassoons
• 4 Horns
• 2 Trumpets in C
• 3 Tromobones
• Timpani + Percussion
• Strings
• Mezzo-Soprano
• Narrator

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Program Notes

Dr. Baruch Milch, Podhaijce

My father's diary, which had revealed to me the true story of his life as well as a personality I had never really known, did not let me rest. I knew I had to write something connected to this painful and terrible text.

When I started rereading his book it felt as if some pages stood out and forced themselves into my awareness. I took the marked pages to my sister and together we edited them so that they could be a basis for my composition.

Sometimes the work was unbearably difficult for me. The thought that it was my own father who was talking about all the horrors he went through left me full of tears, unable to continue. In order to go on with the composition of the music, I had to detach myself emotionally and to imagine that I was writing about a stranger and not someone so close to me.

In Paul Celan's poem “Stretto” I found everything I could look for and integrated it into my father's text.

Dr. Baruch Milch before the war

The composition is written in a simple and clear musical language and is not a conscious attempt to describe the text in musical notes, but rather to give it a suitable background. In the composition there are three songs on texts by Paul Celan. these is also the contract between my father and his family and the Ukrainian farmer who hid them. It is sung at first on a Jewish melody that later becomes typically Christian. I hoped to convey through the music how absurd it all seemed to me when I read the contract for the first time and tried to imagine the surrealistic situation. A family taking upon themselves a commitment by signing a contract the way one buys real estate, so that someone will save their lives.

The third song is a prayer and elegy interwoven with the text of my father's cry to God. The same cry that ends with the question: "Can Heaven be Void" which is the name of both the book and the composition.

Dr. Baruch Milch

My sister, Dr. Shosh Avigal, an important theatre critic, director of various cultural institutions, adviser, researcher, and lecturer on theatre at many universities, was also my dearest friend. When my father, may he rest in peace, wrote his memoirs of World War II, he made the two of us swear to have them published after his death.. It took nine whole years before the book was finally published.

It was Shosh who was the driving force behind the project. She traveled to Poland, and insisted on writing a Hebrew translation that would do justice to the original Polish version. I will never forget how she dragged me to the very places where the terrible things my father wrote about had happened. It was a shattering experience that will remain with me forever.

The work was first performed 5 times in Israel, in March 2003. The reaction of the audience, musicians, music lovers, audiences of all kinds left me overwhelmed.

I dedicate this composition to my sister Shosh Avigal who passed away in February 7th, 2003 from Breast cancer. Blessed be her memory.

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Video and Audio Clips

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Press

The Ra'anana Symphonette conducted by Kynan Jones. World Premiere of Ella Milch-Sheriff's composition "Can Heaven Be Void".

The work by Ella Sheriff "Can Heaven Be Void" for a singer (Daphna Cohen-Licht), a narrator (Alex Anski) and orchestra, sanctifies the holocaust horrors, experienced by the composer's father.

The general and personal challenge of coping with the holocaust is enormous. Perhaps the private horror experienced by her father, endowed Mrs. Sehriff with the personal and yet universal purification evident in this work.

Similar as in Schönberg's work "The Survivor of Warsaw", Mrs. Sheriff also immortalizes the horrors and the pain with a hand of a master, through appropriate and dramatic use of vocal and spoken parts by Daphna Licht and Alex Anski, who strongly imbued their respective parts with humanity.

The music is written with great sincerity and clarity. It conjures up spiritual sounds, and, as in Schubert's songs, it is supportive of the background, the essence and the interpretation. The heavens of Sheriff are in no way void. They are full and I hope she will continue to exploit her compositional skills.

Ora Binur, Ma'ariv, 30.3.2003

Dr. Baruch Milch

World Premiere: "Can Heaven Be Void" by Ella Milch-Sheriff. Ra'anana Symphonette Orchestra. Conductor Kynan Jones. Memorial Hall, Ra'anana.

George Bernard Shaw said: "A music critic is a person waiting for a miracle" and this time the miracle happened. Ella Sheriff presents her composition "Can Heaven Be Void". This work flows like a running streetcar passing along buildings in different emotional realms, which fall upon it to merge into one single body. What an exiting revelation.

The music is built upon fragments of the terrible holocaust memoirs of Dr. Baruch Milch, the father of the composer. Its impact derives from its simplicity, from its asceticism. Mrs. Sheriff does not whine nor does she scream out. Quite to the contrary. That is why it is so powerful. Jewish and Christian musical motives create a terrifying echo. The text (edited by Shosh Avigal) holds a sharp dialogue with the music. Alex Ansky in his role as narrator injects somber colours into the text like a virtuoso trombonist. The Soprano Daphna Cohen-Licht imbues a human touch into this hell.

The philosopher Isiah Berlin said: "No art in the world is capable of expressing the awesome events of the holocaust". It is a pity that he did not hear this shuddering work. The conductor Kynan Jones led the Ra'anana orchestra competently along the work's dramatic path.

Hanoch Ron, Yediot Acharonot, 30.3.2003

The work of Ella Milch-Sheriff, daughter of Dr. Baruch Milch, deals with the most horrifying fragments of her father's diary written during the holocaust in Poland. "Can Heaven Be Void", the title of the cantata composed by Mrs. Sheriff, expresses the scream of Dr. Milch in view of God's silence during those terrible days.

The performance of this work within the framework of a regular musical event, following a banal clarinet concerto by Weber, raises an ethical question as to the appropriate framework for the performance of a cantata of this kind. And is it not a jarring act, juxtaposing it to ordinary classical music designed to give us esthetical pleasure?

Regarding the cantata itself, its impact is way beyond all expectations. Sheriff succeeded in creating, as she herself states, music which is subordinate to the words and which, without any pathos, strengthens, decorates and accentuates them. The use of traditional Jewish melodies and, by way of contrast, Gregorian-Christian tunes, in the scene in which the contract is presented between the Ukrainian peasant and the Jewish family hiding with him, is really chilling. This scene ends with a pleasant ironic cord, which seals the words "the parties waive notarial legalization".

Mrs. Sheriff engaged two excellent performers: The narrator-actor Alex Anski related the terrible testimony of Baruch Milch with clear simplicity, and Daphna Cohen-Licht is wonderful, both in narration and singing. The Synphonette Orchestra offers its public this time an experience which, to say the least, is important and interesting, albeit probably difficult for many.

Hagai Hitron, Ha'aretz, 26.3.2003

The Duessledorf performance By Michael-Georg Muller 11.11.2004 (German)		The Duessledorf performance By Von Jeanne Andreesen 11.11.2004 (German)
Critic by Hagai Hitron, Haaretz 26.03.2003 (Hebrew)		Critic by Ora Binur, Maariv 22.06.2005 (Hebrew)
Critic by Hanoch Ron, Yediot Acharonot 30.03.2005 (Hebrew)		Critic by Ora Binur, Maariv 30.03.2003 (Hebrew)
Article by Neri Livne, Haaretz 9.04.1999 (Hebrew) part 1 part 2 part 3 part 4 part 5		Article by Neri Livne, Haaretz 9.04.1999 (English) part 1 part 2 part 3

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Performances

The Ra'anana Symphonette
Conductor: Kynan Johns
Dafna Cohn-Licht, Sopran
Alex Ansky, Narrator
Fp. March 2003, Ra'anana, Israel (5 peformances)

Berliner Symphonie Orchester
Conductor: Lior Shambadal
Berlin, November 2003 (2 performances)

Chautauqua festival, USA
Uriel Segal, conductor
July 2004

Duesseldorfer Symphoniker
Cosima Osthoff, conductor
November 2004 (4 performances)

The New Haifa Symphony Orchestra
Israel Yinon, conductor
Tel-Aviv, Haifa 2005 (5 performances)

Bochum, Germany
Bochumer Symphoniker
22-27 January 2007

Vancouver Symphony
12, 13 May, 2007