TWO PIANOS: Playing for Life
A Production of Papers Please Inc.
A narrated multimedia concert series about human perseverance under oppression,
with companion exhibit and print materials
Two Pianos Playing for Life Premiere Highlights June 9 2018
PREMIERE
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The concert documentary and companion pop-up curated Exhibit premiered Saturday 9 June 2018 in Philadelphia PA with post-performance discussion and a reception to meet the performers.
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The Settlement Music School generously hosted the event. Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History (NMAJH) furnished early exhibit support, featured Two Pianos as a special Member Event, and gave exhibit items temporary shelter.
The audience ranged from 6 to 80, including old and new friends from Philadelphia, Washington DC, New Jersey, New York, and Houston Texas.
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Two Pianos narration was based on first-person interviews with Anna and Halina. Anna’s daughter and son-in-law Nora Jean and Michael Levin narrated together with Halina’s grandson Kenneth Hoffman, who contributed to the curated exhibit. Russian-born piano duo Stanislava Varshavski and Diana Shapiro performed Anna and Halina as well as program music showcasing works played by them under and after the Nazis. The premiere closed with a 1992 video of Anna, age 84, playing Mozart at a Settlement School chamber music program for seniors started 1988 by Anna's daughter Tania Bieler Haftel (1933-2017), recorded by Tania's daughter Stephanie Haftel. That program (now Adult Chamber Players) remains active.
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Sixty Plus or Minus Adult Chamber Music, Jenkintown Branch, Settlement Music School
June 1992, days before Anna's 84th birthday