Choral Piece of the Day, Installment 61:
"My Red Boots"
for SATB Chorus (divisi) unaccompanied
(2024)
The text for "My Red Boots" is one of only several poems written by my mother and Jewish Holocaust survivor, Rita Hoffman (1927–2018).
My red boots and ruby earrings were snatched away; they were so dear to me.
My youth and family, too, were snatched away in the same way.
I’ll never forget that day.
I’m told now to put it out of my mind.
I find that task very hard.
I can still hear the dogs howling,
the Gestapo rounding us up for apel,*
those dreadful words, “Mach schnell!”**
How can I not remember when my loved ones perished for no reason?
Babies were taken from their mother's arms!
Heaven and earth should have shaken from their cries and have been heard afar.
Yet the world stood still.
Not a word was spoken to try to help us.
I can’t forget the helplessness that we endured. Listen!
Maybe you will hear them, too.
If we do this, we can keep evil from happening again, and again, and again!
—Rita Hoffman (1927–2018)
* Romanian for “call” (roll call).
** German for "Make haste!"
© Copyright 1989 by The Estate of Rita Hoffman.
All rights reserved. Used by permission.
The sheet music for this choral composition is available for sale from Sheet Music Plus.
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A plea to choral directors, performing ensembles, and performers of all kinds: PERFORM JEWISH-CENTRIC MUSIC!
So much of Jewish-centric music has been and continues to be ignored, or worse, boycotted, today because of the crazy, divisive, upside-down times in which we live. A rich treasure-trove of Jewish-centric music exists.
Explore creative programming options from the time of the Renaissance through the music of today. Many reliable databases of sacred and secular Jewish-centric music exist.
Contact me for more programming ideas about my Jewish-centric music, and the music of countless other composers and arrangers, who include both Jews and Gentiles. I will be happy to help point you in whatever direction I am able.
If you are truly devoted to diversity, then you simply cannot arbitrarily exclude the music of a culture that is over 3500 years old because of geopolitics; to do so is the height of hypocrisy. Embrace and perform Jewish music as you would the music of any other culture.
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AN EDITORIAL ON THE EVE OF YOM KIPPUR 2024 (5785)
The Jewish people are the proverbial canary in the poisoned cave: if we are dying in great numbers, and relative to our tiny population, the 1200 individuals murdered on October 7, 2023 in Israel is a great number, then so is the soul of Western Civilization. Anti-Israel bias is Anti-Semitism; using context as an excuse is a rationalization based on the inherently specious concept of moral relativism which, in this case, only serves to dehumanize Jews and delegitimize Israel.
The Holocaust taught the Jewish people something: the diaspora will never be entirely safe for us. We must have our own homeland as a refuge to which to turn if we find ourselves unwelcome in another country.
On October 7, 2024, the same horrors about which my mother of blessed memory warned against happening "again, and again, and again" happened, and is still happening. Babies were again snatched from their mother's arms, and worse - some were decapitated. Nobody anywhere gets to explain away barbarism by claiming victim status for the population of Gaza who elected terrorists as their chosen leaders rather than civil servants and who let them hide in their hospitals, schools, and mosques.
Only 15,000,000 Jewish people remain in the world; around half of them live in Israel, yet some people regard this tiny demographic, the indigenous Jewish people of Israel who have lived there on and off for 3600 years when we were not being driven out of our land by invaders, AS occupiers,
No one gets to treat David like Goliath. There are 1.9 billion Muslims in the world; a large number of them rule huge swaths of land in the Middle East and Northern Africa, so the world will now leave the Jewish people alone in our tiny sliver of land called Israel. You have no choice; we insist that you do.
We are not Jews with trembling knees. We are a brave and proud people and, after the Holocaust, we will never again be victims and be placed in a position to have no recourse. Ever.
To keep what could easily turn from a posting into an article or even a book, suffice it to say that it is the year 5785 for the Jewish people, 2024 for Christians, and 1414 for Muslims if you count the year 610 as the year of the founding of Islam, so the Jews have got you all beat. Am Yisrael Chai! The Nation of Israel Lives!
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Thank you for your time and attention. Be well.
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