Lara Downes (left) and Daniel Hope Culture Music Pianist and classical music ambassador Lara Downes to stream Holocaust Remembrance Day concert Facebook Twitter Email SMS WhatsApp Share By Andrew Esensten | January 27, 2023 Sign up for Weekday J and get the latest on what's happening in the Jewish Bay Area. In honor of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Classical California is streaming a recent concert by pianist Lara Downes and violinist Daniel Hope featuring pieces by Jewish composers who fled Europe before and during World War II. The concert, which took place last week at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, includes works by George Gershwin, Kurt Weill and E.W. Korngold. The latter, a trailblazing film score composer, fled his native Austria for the U.S. in 1934 and wrote scores for 16 Hollywood films. He won Oscars for his scores for “Anthony Adverse” (1936) and “The Adventures of Robin Hood” (1938). “Daniel and I shared music of immigration and transformation that helped to define the American sound,” Downes wrote on Instagram about the concert. “The old world met the new to produce something intensely beautiful and unique to our melting pot.” Downes, who is Jewish and lives in Sacramento, serves as a resident artist at Classical California (90.3 KDFC in San Francisco and 91.5 KUSC in Los Angeles) and hosts the weeknight program “Evening Music with Lara Downes.” As a child in San Francisco, she played piano for Holocaust survivors at the Jewish Home (now the S.F. Campus for Jewish Living). “At the time, it was like a scary place with these very old people who had funny accents, right?” she told J. last year. “My mom was not a stage mother, but there was always an emphasis on using the music for social good. It was, if this is something that really is central to your life, then you need to share it.” Downes has released 17 albums, including “Reflections: Scott Joplin Reconsidered” (2022), which pays tribute to the African American composer known as the “king of ragtime,” and “Exiles’ Café” (2013), which features 19th- and 20th-century music by composers who lived in exile, including Jewish ones. She regularly releases new recordings of music by Black composers through her digital label Rising Song Music. British violinist Daniel Hope is the music director of the Bay Area-based New Century Chamber Orchestra. He has Irish and German-Jewish heritage, and he worked closely with Yehudi Menuhin, considered one of the great violinists of the 20th century. Downes has several upcoming Bay Area performances. On Apr. 2, she will play works by Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn with the Berkeley Symphony at Zellerbach Hall. On May 5 and 6, she will appear with author and cultural commentator John McWhorter at the Mondavi Center in Davis and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, respectively. Andrew Esensten Andrew Esensten is the culture editor of J. Previously, he was a staff writer for the English-language edition of Haaretz based in Tel Aviv. Follow him on Twitter @esensten. Also On J. California Adam Schiff declares bid to replace Dianne Feinstein in Senate Bay Area ‘No Jew Go Away’ scrawled on door at UC Berkeley Local Voice I’m struggling, but I will always fight for the Israel I love TV In season 4, ‘Fauda’ has begun asking some hard questions Subscribe to our Newsletter I would like to receive the following newsletters: Weekday J From Our Sponsors (helps fund our journalism) Your Sunday J Holiday Bytes