• Willa Lentza

• 20-03-2023, Monday, at 6:00 pm - Ticketed event

We thoroughly recommend to you our meeting with Israeli organ builder Uri Shani. Shani is a descendant of Jacob Sarasohn, who in 1875-1912 served as cantor at Szczecin’s (then Stettin’s) New Synagogue. The extraordinary story of this Jewish family will be complemented by a concert of organ music, given by Jakub Stefek.

Jakub Sarasohn’s work as cantor began with the inauguration of a splendid new synagogue built in 1875 in Grüne Schanze, now Dworcowa Street. He conducted liturgy in that building for nearly thirty years. With his closest collaborator, the Christian organist Robert Lahmann, who played the great Emil Kaltschmit organ, and the choir, they turned the synagogue into a major centre on the then cultural map of Stettin, Pomerania (Pommern), and Germany at large.

Uri Shani was brought up on tales about his famous great-grandfather. They made such a powerful impression on him that he decided to become a musician and an organ builder. Today, he runs Israel’s only permanent organ workshop. His most recent instrument was built for the new concert hall of the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance. Thanks to the Lentz Villa’s initiative, Uri Shani will visit Szczecin for the first time in his life. At the meeting, held towards the end of his stay, he will share his experience of visiting his family’s cradle, and talk about the image of Szczecin in the memories of its former inhabitants.

In the second part of the evening, Jakub Stefek will play a concert of synagogal organ music – the kind of repertoire that was performed at Szczecin’s New Synagogue. An academic teacher on the faculty of Szczecin’s Academy of Art, Stefek is also an organist at the synagogue in Pestalozzistrasse, Berlin, which is the only one to cultivate the musical traditions of Jakub Sarasohn and Robert Lachmann. Szczecin, this splendid and inspiring city, is the place where all these themes converge.