Erwin Schulhoff

Whether or not Schulhoff had been born Jewish, his musical and political values would have placed him in disfavor with the Nazi regime. His compositional style, with its emphasis on atonality, jazz and folk elements, was considered ‘degenerate’ by the Third Reich. His political values were equally radical. He was an ardent communist (from the 1930s onwards), and took Soviet citizenship after the Munich agreement. Both religion and politics led to his imprisonment during the German occupation. He perished in the Wülzberg concentration camp in August 1942.