Alma Rose: Vienna to Auschwitz

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Part family biography, part European and Holocaust history, this book traces the life of violinist Alma Rosé, along with that of other members of her illustrious musical family, from her birth in 1906 in one of the world's foremost cultural capitals to her death in a Nazi extermination camp in 1944. It will be particularly fascinating and wrenching to anyone with similar roots. Alma was the niece of the famous composer and conductor Gustav Mahler, at the time director of the Vienna Opera, and the daughter of Arnold Rosé, concertmaster of the Opera Orchestra and the Vienna Philharmonic and leader of his own renowned string quartet. Her older brother Alfred became a noted pianist, conductor, composer, and teacher. Alma, named after her aunt and godmother, Alma Mahler, was taught by her father and, both inspired and intimidated by the family's musical tradition, she became a fairly successful violinist.

In 1930, she established a girls' orchestra called the Viennese Waltz-Girls, with which she toured throughout Europe as conductor and soloist, and which surprisingly had her austere father's blessing because of the high quality of the playing. Her marriage to the famous, dashing Czech violin virtuoso Vása Príhoda soon ended in heartbreak and divorce. Disaster struck in 1938, when Hitler annexed Austria, whose population welcomed him enthusiastically; the country's always latent anti-Semitism erupted swiftly and violently. Though the Rosé family were completely assimilated and had even converted to Christianity, Arnold immediately lost his orchestra position and pension. His wife was ill and died that year, leaving him stranded financially and emotionally. Alfred and his wife managed to flee to Holland, England, and eventually Canada, where he died in 1975; Alma mistakenly thought she was protected by the Czech passport gained through her marriage. With dauntless determination, and with the help of old friends, including the famous violinist Carl Flesch, she got her father and herself to England only months before the outbreak of World War II. The Rosé Quartet's cellist and former principal of the Vienna Philharmonic, Friedrich Buxbaum, had arrived there earlier; he later joined the re-formed quartet.

So far, Alma's story parallels my own. Born in Vienna 20 years later to musical parents who encouraged my violin studies, I grew up near enough the Rosé house to encounter the illustrious concertmaster not only on stage but on the streetcar. We witnessed Hitler's triumphant arrival, but our Czech passports enabled us to escape to Czechoslovakia. When Hitler caught up with us in 1939, we, too, managed with the help of friends to get to England just before the war. A few years later, I was thrilled to be the violinist in a trio with the venerable Buxbaum, who still played with the facility and tone of a man half his age. Here the resemblance ends. While we survived the war in England and ultimately came to America, Alma was tempted by performing opportunities to leave the comparative security of England for Holland, where her career flourished and she earned enough money to help her father.

She was still fulfilling engagements when the Germans overran Belgium and the Netherlands; her efforts to get back to England, or join her brother in America, failed. Staying with friends, she was almost picked up by the Nazis despite a hastily arranged marriage to an "Aryan" Dutchman, and in 1942 she went into hiding, tried to get into Switzerland, but was betrayed, arrested, and deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau.

From here on, the story takes on a surreal character. Shortly after her arrival at what has been called "a wound in the order of being," it was discovered that Alma was a violinist, and, in a grotesque replay of her past, she was asked to take over a poor, threadbare musical ensemble of women inmates. By sheer courage, fortitude, and determination, she turned this motley group into a viable orchestra, training and coaching the players; arranging music for its ill-matched instrumental makeup, from mandolins to sopranos; and driving herself and her musicians to exhaustion. Gaining unprecedented stature and exploiting some of the most brutal camp functionaries' love of music, she saved her musicians from the gas chambers and also obtained some favors and privileges for them. Forty years later, one of them said that there is not a day when she does not remember Alma and thank her. Alma herself succumbed to an undiagnosed illness, which deepened the mystery surrounding her.

Author Richard Newman made friends with Alfred Rosé and his wife in Canada in 1946. The impetus for writing this book was the publication of a memoir called Playing for Time by Fania Fénelon, a singer with Alma's orchestra, which gives a very harsh portrayal of her. Newman's search for the "real" Alma lasted 22 years and took him around the world. His sources are family letters, interviews, and correspondence with family, friends, and surviving members of the orchestra, lending the book an overwhelming immediacy and authenticity. Included are Mahler and Rosé family trees, many pages of photographs, a map of Auschwitz-Birkenau, and a list of the orchestra players. The section dealing with camp life (and death) is written in an unemotional, reportorial style full of facts and figures. That approach may have saved Newman's own sanity, and, by its incongruity with the grisly content, it both blunts and heightens the impact of the indescribable, unimaginable details it recounts. This is a book to numb the mind and sear the soul. --Edith Eisler

Book Description

Alma Ross's story first came to public attention through the intriguing 1980 film Playing for Time. The true story of this heroic woman is now told for the first time. Rose was born to musical royalty in Vienna when the imperial city was the center of the musical world. Her father was violinist and concertmaster Arnold Rose; her uncle was Gustav Mahler. In the 1930s she founded and led a brilliant womens touring orchestra. Like many other Viennese Jews, the Rose family was caught off guard by the rise of Nazism. Alma assisted her family to flee but was herself caught and deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau. There, Alma again formed and led a women's orchestra---the only women's musical ensemble in the Nazi camps---thereby saving the lives of some four dozen women. In telling Alma's full story, the authors honor her and the valiant prisoner-musicians for whom music meant life.

Customer Reviews:

Butterfly among the ashes, a biography of Alma Rose.......2007-08-30

Alma Rose was an incredible human being. After spending the last few evenings immersed in her biography "Alma Rose: Vienna to Auschwitz", I was touched by her ability to use her violin to transcend the evil around her.
Alma was born into the musical elite of turn-of-the-last-century Vienna, the capital of arts and music in Europe. Her uncle was Gustav Mahler and her father, Arnold Rose, the famous concertmaster and conductor of the Vienna Philharmonic. She had a fabled childhood surrounded by musicians and artists.

Alma studied violin from her father at an early age and later with Sevcik. She toured Europe as concertmistress of an all women's orchestra she organized, and was briefly married to violin virtuoso Vasa Prihoda.

All of the fame and glamour ended however when she was captured and interned in the dreaded Auschwitz. Fearing that she was about to be eliminated she asked for her last wish to be able to play the violin. Word quickly spread that she was the Alma Rose of the Rose Quartet and before she knew it, the camp supervisor, assigned her to lead a women's orchestra. For many of the players, the orchestra was the only chance of survival. Alma took pity on people who auditioned and tried to fit them in, whether it was as accordion player, or guitarist, or if they had no playing talent, as copyist and scribe. She took her job seriously, practicing 10-12 hours a day in addition to giving "concerts". All this was under the constant stress and threat of elimination if they did not prove their worthiness to the SS in charge.

Alma maintained a musicality, and in those moments while playing music, they were transported out of their nightmare and back to the preWar Vienna, playing in a cafe. The music also affected both SS and prisoners alike, and on the Sunday concerts, prisoners strained to hear and grasp a small slice of beauty while SS overlords sat in the front row weeping with emotion. How they could love music so much and then turn around and kill mercilessly was beyond the comprehension of the survivors.

Alma saved the lives of many women, and even though she perished, her bravery and dedication lives on in the stories of the survivors she helped.

The author Richard Newman based the book on firsthand knowledge, primary sources such as letters and interviews with survivors, relatives, friends and contemporaries. He maintained a historical accuracy and honest portrayal of Alma's life. You will be touched while unable to grasp the enormity of the horrors that faced the people who were interned in the death camps.

I read this book alongside with "Night" by Elie Wiesel who arrived at Auschwitz shortly before Alma's death. Both books are highly recommended although extremely sad, they show the resilience of the human spirit in absolutely horrible conditions.

A brilliantly presented biography of a gifted musician.......2002-02-11

Alma Rose was born to musical royalty in Vienna (the daughter of famed violinist Arnold Rose and niece of Gustav Mahler). She studied with distinction at the Vienna Conservatory and the Vienna State Academy, and consequently enjoyed a very respectable and successful musical career. In 1932 Alma formed a women's orchestra (Vienna Waltzing Girls) and toured throughout Europe. But like so many others of her class and background, she was totally caught off guard by the Nazi onslaught. Courageously assisting her family's flight from the Nazi's antisemitic pogroms, she was nonetheless caught and sent to the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp. There she took a group of terrified and untrained women and transformed them into an orchestra whose music saved them from being summarily gassed by their Nazi captors. Forty women were to survive that horrific place because of their participation in Alma's prisoner orchestra. But Alma herself was to die of illness in the camps before they were able to be liberated by the Allies. A welcome contribution to Holocaust studies, as well as a brilliantly presented biography of a gifted musician, Alma Rose: Vienna To Auschwitz is a memorial to a gifted musician and a testament to Alma's personal struggle to help as many women survive as she could. It is also a damning indictment of the Nazi horror and an effective counter to the pernicious attempts of historical revisionists to suppress both the atrocities and the courage of those dark times.

great work.......2001-11-10

Richard Newman has spent many years working on this book and it paid off, there can't be a biography on hardly anyone that is better researched. And he has written it in a way that doesn't judge the person, he relates the facts but doesn't try any psychological insight. He leaves this up to the reader. A beautiful, compelling book on a woman that used a difficult position to save as many lives as possible. If ever anyone deserved a monument, it is Alma Rosé. Richard Newman`s book lays the foundation. I will publish the German version in Fall 2002.

A lasting impact.......2001-06-26

My review is best expressed in a letter to the authors. While the letter speaks little of the content of the story, it does the reflections of the reader:

I have just finished your book, Alma Rosé, Vienna to Auschwitz and felt compelled to write a word of thanks for such an excellent book. I have lived in Vienna for 23 years and in our early years I walked by the Rosé house in the Pyrkergasse each day, taking our oldest to the Volkschule. Of course, at that time, I had no idea the importance of number 23. Through your book and others of Viennese history I have gained a profound sense of history that a midwest American, growing up in the suburbs, rarely has a chance to learn.

We have since moved from the 19th district, but each time I am in the city the enormity of life that has gone on before me deeply tugs at my soul. The stones I walk on have carried the lives of so many, each woven into a history of joy and often of utter loss and evil.

I believe your book was one of those that has allowed me to enter into a life past. Through it I have gained new perspective that the joy and beauty I now enjoy is not without the marring of tragedy and sorrow of many who were innocent. I was also able with my family to visit Auschwitz this summer. The visit has left a lasting impact on our minds and it certainly allowed me to have even deeper sense of personal presence as I read your book. The immensity of the tragedy leaves one lost for thoughts and words. The life of Alma Rosé puts a reality to that part of history that seems unbelievable, yet was played out in the very places I have lived and walked.

I visited the Rosé grave in Grinzing last week and noted that Alma's name is inscribed on the headstone (unfortunately, the date is 4/4/44 and not 5/4/44). In honor of her courage and for the lives she most certainly helped spare, I left a memorial candle on her grave. I did not seem fitting to leave the grave without some acknowledgement and sign of respect of her family's life.

Again, thank you for the fine research and excellent presentation of her life. The book must also be considered a memorial not just to one life, but to many who's stories will never be told.

a fascinating story.......2001-04-10

I read this book on recommendation after I read Martin Goldsmith's The Inextinguishable Symphony. This book is an extremely compelling story about the fascinating and tragic life of Alma Rosé, a Viennese violinist with a heavy music pedigree (she was the niece of venerated composer Gustav Mahler and the daughter of violinist Arnold Rosé) who, in spite of her efforts to get out and then to stay alive by leading the women's orchestra in Birkenau, meets her demise in the revier hospital. The story made me gasp and I had to read several paragraphs over again so that I could digest what I was reading. The only problem that I had with this book was that events seemed very out of order throughout. Little stories were stuck in here and there that interrupted the flow of the story. What also surprised me and made me a little angry at the same time was that there were so many events in Alma's life that can't be definitely corroborated, including her behavior as the conductor of the women's orchestra at Birkenau and her death.

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Romance with eyes wide open
It was alright.....
Alma Rose is best lesbian literature I've ever read.
Mental microcosm painted in reader's head
Beautifully wrought, profoundly moving lesbian fiction.

Alma Rose: A Novel (Forbes, Edith)
Edith Forbes
Manufacturer: Seal Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1580050115

Customer Reviews:

Romance with eyes wide open.......2000-10-02

Doesn't matter that this is a love story between two women - it could as easily be any forbidden love. It is about love so big outsiders can't see it. It is about being changed so much by love, waking up so much, that trivial things like "facts" and broken hearts don't matter any more. It's about owning your own life, and never being a victim. This is a book about the wisdom of learning that what happens TO you doesn't matter so much as how you respond. It is an utterly Romantic book, in the best, old sense of the word, and I would recommend it to anyone of any persuasion. (It was recommended to me by a straight woman.)

It was alright............2000-05-02

I read this book all excited-like. I was thinking "Yeah, lesbian love story". I thought the book was actually kind of boring. I had wish that her relationship with Alma Rose had developed more. I wish that she had heard more flack from the town about her relationship with a woman, especially in a small town where they weren't used to the idea of same sex marriages. The book could have been written so much better. I enjoyed it, but I was hoping for more :)

Alma Rose is best lesbian literature I've ever read........1998-10-11

Without a doubt, the novel "Alma Rose" is the best book I've ever read with a lesbian main character. Frankly, I'm biased against the genre, but this book set me, uh, straight. What most struck me was the beautiful language and the thoughtfulness of the narrative. It is a heart-rending book that also makes you think.

Mental microcosm painted in reader's head.......1997-02-15

The introverted world of a small town woman is described as she blossoms, wilts and fights the truth of a love gone forever. The supporting characters come to life with a realism that reminds me of co-workers and neighbors. As the secret world of the main character's head enters the reader's head, the similarity and diversity of perception are simultaneously evoked. In the end, the unyeilding truth of change continues on unchanged, while a mountain of stone yeilds to the chisel of a sculpture dedicated to hope and the past

Beautifully wrought, profoundly moving lesbian fiction........1996-07-09

> There are some genre books that are so good that you know they'd be in contention for a Pulitzer if they were considered mainstream. This is one of those books.
> The heroine is so inarticulate as to be almost mute. That is, until a female trucker rolls into town. She rolls out again almost immediately, leaving our heroine with a choice: she can sit around wringing her hands or she can build a monument which can be seen from the highway and may again draw the trucker into town and back into her life. So she starts dynamiting a mountain and shaping it as her "Alma Rose."
> A startingly good book.

Chinese Export Porcelain in the 19th Century: The Canton Famille Rose Porcelains

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art thief
Famille Rose Museum Catalog

Chinese Export Porcelain in the 19th Century: The Canton Famille Rose Porcelains
John Quentin Feller
Manufacturer: Peabody Essex Museum
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 087577069X

Customer Reviews:

art thief.......2001-06-23

The reason that this book is so very fascinating has to do less with the subject than the author. It is a fine book to be sure, full of helpful and interesting information, but the author, John Quentin Feller, is far more intriguing. Feller was arrested in the early 90's because he was one of the most accomplished and compulsive art thieves in American history. He did 'research' in 8 major museums and stole from them. He didn't do it for monetary gain, though - he would 'donate' the pieces to other museums! Really, really interesting guy.

Famille Rose Museum Catalog.......2000-05-20

This is a beautiful museum catalog of the Peabody Museums's famille rose porcelain collection. Many nice color illustrations of a wonderful collection. There are also a lot of black and white illustrations that are a little hard to make out. This is not a history of famille rose as such although there is a lot of historical information embedded in it. It is also not a collecting guide or price guide.

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Alma Rose; Vienna to Auschwitz
Richard Newman
Manufacturer: Amadeus Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000N2W2K6

Hay Un Dragon En Mi Bolsa De Dormir: (Theres A Dragon In My Sleeping Bag)

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Beautiful story about two brothers and their imagination

Hay Un Dragon En Mi Bolsa De Dormir: (Theres A Dragon In My Sleeping Bag)
James Howe
Manufacturer: Aladdin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Board book

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Customer Reviews:

Beautiful story about two brothers and their imagination.......1999-05-19

This is a beautiful story about two brothers and their imaginary friends. The oldest brother is playing with his Dragon (imaginary friends) while the younger sibiling feels left out...until he creates his own imaginary friend: A Camel!!!! Both imaginary friends start playing with each other :-) ... and so do the brothers... It's a beautiful story, humorous and sweet about being friends and sibilings.

Rosa Alada / A Rose with Wings (Cuentos Para Todo El Ano / Stories the Year 'round)

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Rosa Alada / A Rose with Wings (Cuentos Para Todo El Ano / Stories the Year 'round)
Alma Flor Ada
Manufacturer: Santillana USA Publishing Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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A Rose With Wings (Cuentos Para Todo El Ano / Stories the Year 'round)

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A Rose With Wings (Cuentos Para Todo El Ano / Stories the Year 'round)

Manufacturer: Santillana USA Publishing Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1581052162

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Valiant effort

Through The Roses
Alma Vazquez Garcia
Manufacturer: Authorhouse
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1418435740

Book Description

"Ive kissed too many boys," Eliza Smith says when asked why she's been exiled to off-season Miami.

It is 1925. The war has been over for more than half a decade, and Victorian America is quickly changing. Too quickly. Where Eliza's mother lived in a world where a chaste kiss was first given upon betrothal, Eliza lives in a world where women are giving away even up to their very bodies indiscriminately. But the human heart does not evolve as quickly as the times, if the human heart was designed to evolve into baseness at all.

What happens when a harsh world collides with innocent hearts?

A story of brokenness, betrayal, and the unconditional love that redeems, Through the Roses will take you through the lowest lows to leave you on the highest heights. A story of yesterday's generation, yet timely enough for today's MTV Generation.

Customer Reviews:

Valiant effort.......2005-04-17

A newcomer to romance novels, Ms Vasquez Garcia hasn't met a cliche she doesn't like. A strong editor would have quicken the novel's sluggish pace. Character dialogue was mundane throughout. I hope her plays' dialogues are snappier. Otherwise, dull, dull dull.

Alma Rose: Vienna to Auschwitz.(Review) (book review): An article from: Notes

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Alma Rose: Vienna to Auschwitz.(Review) (book review): An article from: Notes
Jeanne M. Thompson
Manufacturer: Music Library Association, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

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Book Description

This digital document is an article from Notes, published by Music Library Association, Inc. on March 1, 2001. The length of the article is 1014 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Alma Rose: Vienna to Auschwitz.(Review) (book review)
Author: Jeanne M. Thompson
Publication: Notes (Refereed)
Date: March 1, 2001
Publisher: Music Library Association, Inc.
Volume: 57 Issue: 3 Page: 663

Article Type: Book Review

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'Entre las almas y entre las rosas....' (análisis sobre la reforma electoral en México)(TT: 'In between souls and roses...') (TA: analysis of the electoral reform in Mexico): An article from: Proceso

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'Entre las almas y entre las rosas....' (análisis sobre la reforma electoral en México)(TT: 'In between souls and roses...') (TA: analysis of the electoral reform in Mexico): An article from: Proceso
Carlos Castillo Peraza
Manufacturer: CISA Comunicacion e Informacion, S.A. de C.V.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
ASIN: B00096PYKQ
Release Date: 2005-07-28

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Proceso, published by CISA Comunicacion e Informacion, S.A. de C.V. on August 4, 1996. The length of the article is 1663 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: 'Entre las almas y entre las rosas....' (análisis sobre la reforma electoral en México)(TT: 'In between souls and roses...') (TA: analysis of the electoral reform in Mexico)
Author: Carlos Castillo Peraza
Publication: Proceso (Magazine/Journal)
Date: August 4, 1996
Publisher: CISA Comunicacion e Informacion, S.A. de C.V.
Issue: n1031 Page: p40(3)

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Customer Reviews:

A Classic Work On the UFO Controversy.......2000-11-04

Vallee is a true visionary in the UFO field, asking the big questions and nearly always taking the larger view. That UFOs and the "contacts" they make will humans do not fit well into the current picture of interstellar Space Brothers, based purely on observational evidence is a view that most, if not all, UFO buffs will initially reject. However, a careful reading of this book reveals Vallee's painstaking thoroughness in investigating a baffling phenomenon- a phenomenon of contradiction and deception.

The deception goes further than the oft-contradictory message of the aliens: many on Earth are willing messengers of deception as well. The information gap caused by scientific, military, and governmental refusal to seriously consider the phenomenon's true nature have caused all manner of charletons and manipulators to fill the vacuum created by the willful refusal to acknowledge the reality of UFO incidents.

Many of Vallee's fears have already come to pass- the leaders of the Heaven's Gate suicide cult are chronicled nearly twenty years before their mass death. Vallee's observation that whoever is able to eventually control the UFO phenomena may well be coming true before our eyes, yet tragically most are unwilling to see the truth objectively.

This is a complex book that really needs careful reading more than once. If you do this, you'll never look at the UFO phenomena in the same way again.

messengers of deseption.......2000-07-10

I have read several books on this subject and by far, this is the best I have read so far. This is not your typical ufo book with just information about the subject. This book goes very deep into every aspect of it. It demostrates not only what ufo's are trying to show, but also what they are trying to hide. This book is excelent. I would recomend it to serious readers.

Be aware of the deceptive, almost demonic nature of "aliens".......1999-01-19

Vallee has written one of the best, first-person-experienced revelations regarding the true nature (deceptive, tricky and harmful) of our supposed "spacebrothers". For everyone who has read "Communion" or other such tomes, BE SURE to get ahold of 'Messengers of Deception' - it's the other side of the coin that needs so desparately to be told...and heeded. Well-written, action-packed and sincerely offered, this author's book should be a 'required reading' for all earthlings- who seem to be nothing but a fruitful field for mischief and deception in the eyes of, and for, the 'aliens'. Some REAL SPOOKY real goings-on here...a true-to-life "X" file. One of the very first books (and authors) to hit on the true intentions of those 'not from this world' and thier human allies.CONTACT THE PUBLISHER AND ASK FOR A RE=RELEASE! This is probably much of whatALBERT K. BENDER KNEW before his untimely and highly controversial death. Betcha.

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