Our value is 'Courage'. We are going to look at people in history who have shown great courage and will link to to music.

Oskar Schindler was a German businessman. He helped save the lives of more than 1,000 Jews during the Holocaust of World War II (1939–45). He was a very courageous man who put himself in a very dangerous position in order to protect the lives of others. Steven Spielberg made a film about him in 1993 called 'Schindler's List'. This piece of music is taken from the film soundtrack.

Oskar Schindler was born on April 28, 1908, in Svitavy, Moravia, Austria-Hungary (now in the Czech Republic).  His family lived in an area which was called Sudetenland. Although they weren't living in Germany, they were of German descent. When Germany took over the Sudetenland in 1938, Schindler joined the Nazi Party. 

Schindler went to live in Kraków, Poland. He opened a factory there. By 1942 nearly half of his workers were Jewish. The same year the Nazis decided to kill all the Jews in areas controlled by Germany. At first, Schindler kept his Jewish workers safe by bribing German officials. In 1944 Schindler’s factory was moved to Brnenec, Czechoslovakia, close to his hometown. Before the move, Schindler, Emilie, and his staff made a list of Jewish workers he said he needed for the new factory. Eventually, about 1,100 workers arrived at Brnenec. They spent the remainder of the war building ammunition that was made to fail. The Jews he saved came to be called Schindlerjuden. 

Cor Anglais

In this piece there is a solo violinist who plays alongside a solo cor anglais. (a cor anglais translates as 'English horn'... but it is not English or a horn! It is a woodwind instrument). 

The Cor anglais player here is called Davida Scheffers. She has a painful neuromuscular condition which has meant she struggles to play her instrument. She didn't think she would ever get to play with a professional orchestra again. Davida’s dream was to play with the Netherlands Symphony Orchestra. 

And last year, she managed it. If you watch to the end, you will see her cry as it was such an emotional achievement that she had found the courage to do.