The Lost Cellos of Lev Aronson

by Frances Brent

Book Overview

Brent explores the fate of Lev Aronson, first cellist for the Latvian orchestra, and the prized instruments that passed through his hands as a way of understanding what was lost and preserved during... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1934633119
• ISBN13: 9781934633113
• Release Date: July 2009
• Publisher: Atlas
• Length: 216 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.4" x 7.1"

Customer Reviews

The Lost Cellos of Lev Aronson

This is the most incredible biography I have ever read: of a cellist who lived through the Holocaust, was forced to work in a labor camp, escaped and finally came to America. A very special story.

Review of The Lost Cellos of Lev Aronson

I loved this book. At first glance, and through the first 50-75 pages it seems detached and dry. Full of facts touched with tidbits of humanity. In the latter half of the book the stories really start to come alive. A quote: A student who faithfully does everything that his teacher tells him to may become an excellent instrumentalist but will be a poor teacher- however one who has struggled to discover what is important is able to tell someone else. I was a good student, but I had a lot of time to start thinking about things when I was int he camps. I was imprisoned yet strangely free, because thinking was the one thing that couldn't be taken from me .... They couldn't tell if I was thinking or not .... So very true. As a musician, my heart broke when I read this, trying to think of what it would be like to think about the music, but not be able to play it, or listen to it, or know if I would ever be able to immerse myself in the moments we strive for, as musicians. Another passage tells the story of Lev given a time period of one hour to fill a cart with coal from a mine. They had no watches, no way of telling time. So the incredibly smart man he was, he sung through concertos in his mind. Three of them. 20 minutes long each. Then there was the welder - the man who saw that, despite Lev's protests, Lev was not a welder and had simply said so to avoid being taken away never to be seen again. And this welder, a civilian, he hungered for musical knowledge. So he welded for Lev, and Lev taught him. Moments throughout the book are heart-breaking, it is, after all, a story of a Jew during WWII. But the abiding love of music, of his instrument and the definition of Lev as a musician is prominent throughout the book and makes it a book worth reading - especially if you love music like I do.

Our friend, Lev

Mr. Aronson was a friend of my parents. I remember him as a very pleasant but quiet man who played the cello for the Dallas symphony who spent time at our house. I knew that he was Jewish and that the Nazi's did bad things to him. Had no idea how bad till I read this fabulous book. This book should be required reading for every high school student in America and Europe. Someone should hog-tie the psychotic Iranian president and read this book to him. It broke my heart but what a wonderful book.

The Lost Cellos of Lev Aronson gives voice to Mr. Aronson's yearnings

I heard Frances Brent speak about and read from The Lost Cellos of Lev Aronson The Lost Cellos of Lev Aronson in New Haven and had to buy it. I am a former professional trombonist who has lived with and loved a cellist. As a trombonist I also played a great deal of cello music. This wonderful slim volume gives Mr. Aronson a posthumous voice for his pain, frustration and imcomprehension of the ordeal he endured during the Shoah. Though he achieved significant success as the principal cellist of the Dallas Symphony and as a teacher after the war, his dreams of becoming a major soloist like his teachor, Gregor Piatagorsky, were destroyed by the Nazis. He lost so much, but continued to create new relationships and new opportunities even in the middle of the horror. Ms. Brent brings so much of his experiences to life and gives life to his own words in a wonderful, straightforward way. Bravo!

Epic chronicle of cellist and Holocaust survivor

Really loved the book. Lev Aronson, born in Germany but raised in Latvia, travels the capitals of Europe as a young man studying under and playing with the greatest musicians of his time. Berlin, Prague, Paris, Florence. He speaks 6 or 7 languages--Russian, Yiddish, Lett, German, French, English. Alfred Rosenberg was to stolen instruments what Goebbels was to stolen art and Aronson's irreplaceable Amati cello is taken by the Germans. And so is Lev Aronson. Throughout the slim volume (can be read in one thrilling reading) Brent gives us morsels of musical lore, medieval history, interesting mini-biographies of composers and virtuoso musicians. But really the book is about the details of survival. Luck, youth, finding the occasional musician in the labor camps and how these friendships sustained him. How music sustained him even tho there was no cello. But always, luck. I've been reading Holocaust-related books (fiction, history, memoirs) for 45 years and it is such a thrill for a book to be a discovery. Frances Brent is a wonderful writer and the last 20 pages are notes, footnotes, references and sources that are in themselves really interesting and informative.