Rafael Schächter

Raphael Schecter was a Czechoslovakian Jew living in Prague at the time of the Nazi occupation. He, along with many others, were forcibly removed from Prague and sent to the Terezin concentration camp. Here, Schecter, a pianist and choral director by trade, set up a smuggled piano in the basement of the men's barracks housing. Without the constant oversight of Nazi soldiers within the camp, Schecter was able to assemble a male choir to keep morale high. He also managed to slip by the barred gates of the men's section to the woman's barracks to assemble a female choir there as well. When the genders were reintegrated by the Nazis, Schecter's established choir was able to gain clemency from the camp director. With his choir, which numbered well in excess of 200 members, he was able to create, often from a single score, productions of famous operas and works of classical music.

Near the end of 1941, Schecter became obsessed with the idea of performing one of Mozart's requiems as a mass for the Nazis, he believed, would be damned in the final judgement. From a single score, he had his singers memorize the latin lyrics, learn the translation, and individually taught them the tune. In September, the Nazis resumed deporting prisoners to Auschwitz extermination camp. However, though his choir was decreasing rapidly with time, Schecter refused to perform the requiem before it was perfect. Finally, in January of 1942, Schecter's masterpiece premiered. Over the following months, even as his choir shrunk, the requiem was performed 15 times. Finally, when only 60 members of the choir remained, Schecter retired the piece. The final performance, however, came afterwards when Schecter was invited to perform the piece before visiting members of the International Red Cross and Schutzstaffel (S.S.). Unable to resist performing this piece to the Nazi's face, Schecter gathered his choir for one final performance.

Only a few weeks after this final performance, Schecter was loaded into a railroad cattle car with approximately 1,000 other prisoners. They were transported during a 3 day journey to the infamous Auschwitz camp. While his final fate is unclear, it is known that Schecter died at the hands of his captors in this camp, likely killed because he was perceived as too old to be useful.

His ashes, as cremation was customary at the camp, were scattered without a memorial or marking at the camp only a few months before the Soviet push which liberated the camp.