Composer Nicholas Wing gave the world premiere of three works on this week’s program, including a piece performed with a violin once played by a member of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra (then known as the Palestine Philharmonic), founded by Bronisław Huberman.

Huberman assembled the “orchestra of exiles” during WWII with Jewish musicians fired by Nazis, eventually providing refuge for hundreds from the Third Reich. The instrument has been in Nashville as part of the Violins of Hope initiative. 

Nashville Symphony violinist Carolyn Wann Bailey performed with Wing for his piece Her Voice from the Shoah, the title a reference to the Hebrew word for the Holocaust. The piece will be performed again next month at the Blair School of Music with cellist Michael Samis, whose grandmother Sabina Rosenzweig survived Auschwitz and other camps. 

Joined in the studio by a small audience of students from the Jewish Middle School of Nashville, Wing also performed two works with flutist Tessa Loftis, including narrated selections from a ballet suite and music inspired by Nashville’s statues. 

Set List: 

Nicholas Wing: Her Voice from the Shoah 

Nicholas Wing: The Beautiful, Mysterious Statue

Nicholas Wing: Fantasia on a Winter’s Gift (Ballet Suite)