The City Choir of Washington

The Orchestra of Terezin Remembrance

Murry Sidlin, creator & conductor

The concert drama, Defiant Requiem: Verdi at Terezin, tells the story of the courageous Jewish prisoners in the Theresienstadt Concentration Camp (Terezin) during World War II who performed the famous Verdi Requiem while experiencing the depths of human degradation. Conductor Rafael Schächter told the choir, "We will sing to the Nazis what we cannot say to them."

This multimedia performance combines Verdi's magnificent music with testimony from survivors of the original chorus, footage from a propaganda film about the camp, and actors speaking the words of the imprisoned conductor Rafael Schächter and others.