Indianapolis Opera Education and Community Engagement

Grades 5-9 EDUCATORS & PARENTS: Vedem is part of our Brundibar & Vedem Project, originally scheduled for April 2020, now postponed until the 2020-2021 season. This production celebrates the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi concentration camps in Europe, focusing specifically on the camp near Prague called Terezin, or Terezienstadt. Brundibar was written by the Jewish Czech composer Hans Krasa in 1938, and was performed by children in the camp for visiting dignitaries, including the Red Cross, as part of the Nazi propaganda effort. Vedem was written by American composer Lori Laitman in 2010, and tells the story of the boys living in the same room in Terezin who maintained a secret underground newspaper called “Vedem” throughout their imprisonment. These three excerpts from Vedem describe the thoughts and feelings of the captive children of Terezin.

Felipe Prado, tenor
Laura Zahn, mezzo-soprano
Andrew Pham, piano

The Brundibar & Vedem Project provides an incredible opportunity to share this important historical event, as experienced through the perspectives of children. We are offering educational programming as part of this Project, including school performances of Brundibar and supplementary curriculum guides, with generous assistance from the Jewish Federation of Greater Indianapolis.

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