I grew up during the time of the Weimar Republic. Berlin was the epicenter of the era’s frenetic explosion of art, music, philosophy and intellectual spirit they called the Weimar Culture. Those years were also pinnacle years for German and Berlin Jewry. At least initially, we never felt displaced or excluded. Jews held positions of high esteem, and we were an integral part of the burgeoning cultural scene. Max Liebermann painted striking impressionistic paintings, Otto Klemperer and Bruno Walter often led the Philharmonic, Erich Fromm was a noted psychiatrist, Arnold Schoenberg and Kurt Weill were composing music and in 1921, Albert Einstein won the Nobel Prize in physics. And they all had dinner at our home, except for Professor Einstein, even though my mother invited him several times.
We lived six blocks from the Tiergarten, five hundred acres of winding trails, forests, gardens, roads, sculptures and bridle paths, all for me to explore. I spent whatever time I could romping through the gardens and forests of the Tiergarten, most times with my poodle, Mitzi. Many an evening, when I’d stayed out too long, I’d return home to face my mother’s stern reprimand, her arms folded across her chest. Do I know what time it is? Why do I want to put her through such worry? Couldn’t I be just a little more considerate? Still, a sunny day would come along and off I’d go to my enchanted woods.
While my mother took on the responsibilities of ushering me through my childhood to the woman she expected me to be, it was my father who introduced me to my first and enduring love—my violin. There was never a question about which musical instrument I would play, or who would be my mentor. It was only a matter of when I would take it up. Papa told me my fingers needed to mature before I could begin serious studies. I was five when he gave me my first violin.
Naturally, the occasion was a dinner party. The guests included Wilhelm Furtwängler, the principal conductor of the Philharmonic. Arthur Nikisch had died suddenly of a heart attack and Uncle Wilhelm, as I had come to call him, was hired as principal conductor and music director. Uncle Wilhelm and Papa—the maestro and his concertmaster—had formed a very close friendship. Since Papa let me tag along whenever he could, I came to know and love Uncle Wilhelm.
It was during coffee service that Papa brought out a package, placed it on the table and called me over. I squealed when I saw it was a violin. Considerably smaller than my father’s, it was beautiful—light, delicate and richly polished. It was a bench-made violin, crafted by a single master violin maker in Stuttgart to my father’s strict specifications. Papa held it to my chin, placed the bow in my right hand and my fingers on the fingerboard, and from then on, my fate was sealed. I drew the bow across the strings and, from the sound, you would think someone had stepped on the cat’s tail. Papa clapped and Uncle Wilhelm nodded his approval. “That’s a beautiful violin, Ada. Given time, the instrument will open nicely,” Uncle Wilhelm said.
When Uncle Wilhelm had left, Papa lifted me upon his knee, placed my violin in a ready position, adjusted my hand, told me to keep my thumb curled and my fingers flexible and helped me draw the bow so that it actually sounded like a violin. “We’ll work together every day, Ada, and soon you and your violin will be best friends.”
From then on, unless the Philharmonic was on tour, Papa and I spent an hour a day on my lessons. And Papa was right. We became best friends.
Berlin, November 1929
Winter had come early to the Tiergarten. There was a covering of November snow and the forest was sugar-frosted. Mitzi and I were out and about early to make fresh tracks. Later in the day, I was scheduled to try out for the prestigious Berlin Junior Orchestra. And I was excited. Normally the cutoff was twelve and although I was only eleven, Papa convinced the director that I was proficient and should get a chance. After all, Nathan Milstein was accepted at the St. Petersburg conservatory at age eleven. Yehudi Menuhin was seven when he played with the San Francisco Symphony and thirteen when he played with the Berlin Philharmonic.
“She’s a natural,” Papa said to Dr. Kritzer, director and conductor of the Junior Orchestra. “A prodigy.” Proud papa or not, he was the Philharmonic’s concertmaster, and his praise carried a lot of weight. Dr. Kritzer allowed me to participate in the auditions with the understanding that I would probably need a few more years of seasoning. Both Papa and I thought I was seasoned enough.
It had been six years since Papa gave me my violin, and thanks to his daily instruction, my skills had increased dramatically. Although my parents supplemented my instruction with sessions at the Stern Academy, Papa was the best of all my teachers. He made learning fun. He never ended a session without positive feedback. Teaching technique or not, negative criticism would not have been in his nature. He was as kind and gentle a man as God ever created. I practiced as hard as I could and as often as I could and not just because Papa demanded it. Quite the contrary. He often told me to put down the instrument and go out and play. But my violin beckoned to me and I was constantly energized by my progress. I took to my scales and my études like Mitzi took to her dinners. We devoured them. “Wolfed them down,” as my mother would say.
The Junior Orchestra evaluations were held at the Philharmonie, the magnificent home of the Berlin Philharmonic. I had been a frequent visitor since I was old enough to walk. It was like a second home. Not so for the other candidates, who were visibly intimidated by the prodigious venue. They were wide-eyed and skittish. There were perhaps twenty-five to thirty of us trying out. We were sorted into sections—brass, strings, woodwinds, percussion—and taken into separate rehearsal rooms. Nine of us were candidates for the string section.
The Junior Orchestra was open to both boys and girls. It was gender-neutral, unlike the Philharmonic, which did not have a single woman musician. I raised that subject with my father off and on. “Why aren’t there any women in your orchestra? Women are just as good as men. Surely some are better.”
“I have no justifiable explanation,” he said. “There are no women members of any major orchestra in the world. And it’s not because they’re not good enough. It’s just been that way for as long as anyone can remember. Women play in string quartets, in ensembles, in chamber orchestras and in a few of the smaller orchestras and opera companies. And goodness knows, women soloists have played in major music venues all over the world. Clara Schumann played with every major orchestra in Europe fifty years ago. Myra Hess recently played with Thomas Beecham at the New Symphony Orchestra in London.”
“But they were soloists playing concertos, not permanent members of an orchestra,” I said. “I want to be a full-fledged member.”
“You’re right, and someday that will change. I predict you will play for one of the world’s great orchestras.”
“I will. I will play for the Berlin Philharmonic alongside my Papa. Just watch. I will be the first. A pioneer.”
At the audition, a sixteen-year-old cellist was the first to be called. I could see that her hands were sweaty, and she had to start over twice. She had tears in her eyes when she left the stage. A tall girl with a string bass was next. She also made a number of technical errors. Later in the afternoon, midway through the tryouts, we took a break. The boy sitting next to me struck up a conversation. He was a violinist too.
“What are you going to play for them?” he asked me. He wore large glasses and his blond hair could have used a brushing. His arms were long and thin, as though they were growing faster than the rest of his body, but his face was pleasing in a kind and innocent way. His voice was changing; it wandered between octaves. He seemed apprehensive every time they were about to call the name of the next candidate.
“I’m going to play a Paganini caprice,” I said, and he gasped.
“Are you kidding? Number 24? You? Are you some kind of wizard? That’s an impossibly hard piece. It has parallel octaves, double and triple stops, even a left-hand pizzicato, and you have the nerve to play that at your audition?”
I laughed. “I’m not doing Caprice no. 24, that’s over my head. I’m playing the one in E major. Number 9.
It’s not all that hard.”
“Well, I could practice Paganini till my fingers bled and I couldn’t play any of them well enough to bring them to a tryout,” he said. “I’m playing a Mozart sonata, an easy one. I’ve been working on it for a long time. I understand you are Concertmaster Baumgarten’s daughter.”
I nodded. “And I’m not twelve. I guess that’s cheating.”
“It’s not cheating if you have the skills. I’m almost fourteen. My name is Kurt Koenig.”
“I’m Ada. Is your father a musician too?” I asked.
“Oh no. He’s a soldier. Or he was a soldier. My whole family—father, grandfather, uncles—they’ve all been military. That would be my future as well if Germany wasn’t demilitarized. Now my father works in a hardware store. He’s not really happy about that.”
When we reconvened, it was my turn. I stepped up to the stage and announced that I was playing Paganini Caprice no. 9. It raised the eyebrows of the judges. One of them said, “Very good, Miss Baumgarten. Go ahead whenever you’re ready. Don’t be nervous.”
That made me smile. With my violin under my chin, I was never nervous; I was totally at ease. And as for the Paganini, I knew the piece. I loved the little melody, and the way it imitated flutes on the upper two strings and horns on the lower strings. Paganini called it “The Hunt.” My fingers flew and before I knew it the three-minute étude was finished. I bowed and my audition was over. I saw the judges nod to each other.
The news that I had passed my tryout and been selected for the Junior Orchestra was delivered to me by my father at dinner. “You wowed them,” he said.
I was giddy. I shouted with glee and danced around the room. My mother laughed.
“Do you know if Kurt made it?” I asked. “Kurt Koenig? He was very good too.”
My father shook his head. “I don’t know. I heard that one other violinist was chosen, but I don’t know the name.”
My mother had made a special dinner to celebrate and, of course, we had a guest. This time it was a banker, Alfred Gross. My audition was the subject of conversation for the first hour. After that, it was the economy. There had been a stock market crash in the United States. How would that affect Germany? Since the Armistice eleven years ago, the German economy had been struggling, but now it seemed that the Western world was in for a depression, or so Mr. Gross predicted. Hard economic times meant less support for the orchestra, or so my father said.
SIX
En Route—Somewhere over the North Atlantic Ocean, 3:15 a.m.
LIAM STIRRED AND STRETCHED his arms. “What are you reading? Why aren’t you sleeping?”
“I can’t sleep on a plane, you know that. I’m reading the manuscript, the one Gabi sent.”
“Does it unravel the mystery of who owns the villa?”
“Not so far. It’s the story of a girl named Ada Baumgarten. Apparently, she was a child prodigy in prewar Berlin.”
“Why would Gabi give you that to read? Is Ada really Gabriella Vincenzo? Is that the reason?”
“I don’t think so. Ada Baumgarten was born in 1918. She’d be ninety-nine if she were still alive. Tony said Gabi was seventy-eight.”
“Maybe she’s Gabi’s mother.”
Catherine shrugged. “So far she’s only eleven years old and playing her violin in the Berlin Junior Orchestra.”
“So why do you think it was so important for Gabi to overnight that book to you?”
“I have an idea. I’ll let you know later if I’m right.” She shifted in her seat and arched her back. “You know, Liam, I’m feeling really guilty about this trip. We shouldn’t have taken Tony’s offer. The chances of helping his aunt are pretty slim. I reviewed the records and they don’t look good.”
“This is a fine time to have second thoughts.”
“That’s not fair. I expressed my concern to both of you last week. Now Tony’s spent a lot of money and I feel bad.”
“We can repay him for the airfare. Staying at the villa is free.”
“It’s not just the money. We took the assignment on the premise that we could provide a service, maybe assist in preventing the eviction. We gave them hope. I’m thinking that was pretty reckless and irresponsible on our part.”
“They had nowhere else to turn, Cat. We did give them hope, but there were no promises and they understood that. Maybe you can negotiate a resolution. And who knows, you might find something to turn the tables. You’re a damn good lawyer.”
Catherine shook her head. “But not a magician.”
Liam grabbed his little pillow and gave Catherine a kiss. “This plane is not going to turn around, so we might as well finish going to Italy and see what we can do.”
Catherine returned to her reading.
Berlin, November 1931
Mr. Gross’ prediction was correct. The crash in the United States and the subsequent worldwide depression had a devastating impact in Germany. Within months, millions of people lost their jobs and several banks were forced to close. Mr. Gross came over to say his good-byes at our dinner table. His bank had shut its doors the previous April and been vandalized by angry depositors. Mr. Gross was on his way to Philadelphia to live with relatives.
“Jacob,” he said, “if you’re smart, you and Friede will get out of Germany now. I see no improvement on the horizon and the orchestra is bound to lose its funding. Why don’t you seek out a position in an American orchestra—New York or Philadelphia or Boston or Chicago.”
My father shook his head. “We still have patrons. We don’t fill the seats like we used to, but things can turn around.”
“I’m not just talking about the economy, Jacob. The political climate is changing. Oppressive times like this are ripe for exclusionary right-wing populists. You can see it growing. Extremist parties are gaining followers. You saw it in the 1930 election. President Hindenburg was forced to issue emergency measures. Now I hear that Adolf Hitler is going to run against Hindenburg in the 1932 elections. He’s that ranting maniac with the National Socialist German Workers’ Party—the Nazi Party.”
My father shrugged it off. Politics didn’t concern him. “Alfred, I’m truly sorry for your circumstances, you know I am, and I wish you weren’t leaving, but the Nazis are a minority fringe group. In last year’s Reichstag election, they got less than twenty percent.”
“Up from two percent, Jacob. They went from two percent in 1928 to eighteen percent in 1930. What does that tell you? Times are bad, and people want answers. The Nazis have support from the industrialists whose hands have been tied since the Armistice. Even more worrisome to people like you and me is the fact that Hitler preaches anti-Semitism. He wrote about it in his book, which is now a bestseller. He’s a hateful man. You should explore options in the U.S.”
I listened to the men talking and I hoped that my father didn’t want to move to the United States. I had just turned thirteen, I liked my house, I liked my school, I liked my Tiergarten and I especially liked the friends I had made in the Junior Orchestra. We were working on our winter concert: Haydn’s Symphony no. 82 and Mendelssohn’s Italian. I had moved up and was now playing in the first violin section, fourth chair. To make it all the more exciting, I sat directly in front of Kurt. He was in the second section and doing well. We had become good friends. I would meet him in the canteen a half hour before practice began, and we’d share a soft drink and talk. He was funny. Sometimes in practice he would poke me in the back. I’d turn around and he’d say, “It wasn’t me,” and I’d try to put on my angry face, but most times I laughed.
In late November, Kurt told me that things were rough at his house. His father had lost his job and was talking about selling the family car. If that happened, he would probably have to leave Junior. Like most of us, he took the bus straight to orchestra practice after school, but he needed a ride home at night after practice. I told him not to worry; I would ask my father if we could drive him home.
That night I raised the subject. Could we drive Kurt home from pract
ice if his father lost his car? Papa hesitated. Kurt’s neighborhood was on the other side of the city. “Pleeease,” I begged. “If he doesn’t have a ride, he’ll have to quit and he’s a really good player. And he’s my friend.”
My father smiled. “How do I let you talk me into these things? Okay, if Mr. Koenig sells his car, we’ll offer to drive Kurt home.” I was overjoyed.
A few weeks later, Kurt’s father did sell his car and I extended the offer. Surprisingly, we got a little pushback from Kurt’s father. Mr. Koenig was not a particularly friendly man, and I felt he was resentful of us—we hadn’t suffered as much as he had in the struggling economy. Initially he said no, he couldn’t pay his share for the rides. My father said he didn’t expect any money, he was happy to help out.
“We are not a charity,” Kurt’s father said. “Our situation is temporary. Work is scarce. Maybe not for a concertmaster, but for the average German workingman.” Then he hung his head. “But I will support my son, so Kurt may ride with you. Thank you.”
“Oh, it’s nothing,” my father said. “No trouble at all.”
Mr. Koenig added, “But just until things get better. Then I will drive Kurt myself.”
“Of course,” my father said, and from then on, we drove Kurt home.
Our rides after practice were a lot of fun. Sitting next to each other in the backseat, we laughed a lot. We talked about music, we talked about technique and we gossiped about the other kids in the orchestra. I really enjoyed Kurt’s company. Soon we were furtively interlocking little fingers in the backseat. I thought my father hadn’t noticed, but he took me aside one night and reminded me that I was only thirteen.
In January 1932, Kurt told me that his father had found a job with the Sturmabteilung as a security guard for the upcoming political elections. The SA, as they were called, had been providing protection for the Nazi Party at its rallies and assemblies. They wore brown shirts and were organized like a military branch with squads and group commanders, ultimately responsible to Hitler as head of the Nazi Party. That job suited his father perfectly. He was a military man at heart.
The Girl from Berlin--A Novel Page 3
