Each year thousands of activities take place across the world to mark Holocaust Memorial Day.

On this occasion, the Embassy of Italy and the Italian Cultural Institute in Valletta have organised the screening of the 2017 docu-film Maestro: Alla ricerca della musica nei campi directed by Alexandre Valenti, in order to ensure that the spirit of remembrance of that dark and tragic period of history, remains fresh in the personal and collective memory of all of us. 

Maestro is dedicated to Francesco Lotoro, a music teacher, composer and pianist, who tracked down thousands of songs, symphonies and operas composed in Nazi concentration, forced labour and prisoner of war camps elsewhere before and during World War II. 

Lotoro spent nearly 30 years rescuing more than 8,000 pieces of written and oral work from around the world. Lotoro’s search for the lost music involved scouring bookshops and archives as well as interviewing Holocaust survivors. 

He accumulated about 8,000 pieces of music including scores written on scraps of scavenged paper, toilet paper and newspaper, composed in allied as well as axis camps.

The docu-film is a journey through time that wants to fight the oblivion and to preserve the memories of men and women who found their way against destruction throughout their music.  

The screening, in Italian with English subtitles, will be shown at the Italian Cultural Institute, St George’s Square, Valletta tomorrow at 6pm. 

Entrance is free. However reservation is required by sending an e-mail to segreteria.iiclavalletta@esteri.it