From 2 to 9 October 2007, 24 students from the Institute of Music at Carl von Ossietzky University, accompanied by three teachers (Fred Ritzel, Silja Stegemeier and Peter Vollhardt), visited the Department of Music at Towson University near Baltimore in the USA. The occasion was the celebration of the 20th anniversary of the partnership between the two universities, which was also attended by the President of Oldenburg University, Prof Dr Uwe Schneidewind. The Oldenburg students presented their revue "It's Oh So Quiet - Exile Composers in Hollywood", which uses selected pieces of music to show which great composers were expelled from Nazi Germany - whether because of their Jewish origins, their political views or the works labelled 'degenerate music' by the Nazis - and who found employment in the Hollywood film industry in the USA, where some of them enjoyed great success. The multimedia revue works with music and scenes that have been combined with film clips, photos and original sound recordings of the composers talking about their music to create a collage. After the successful performances in Oldenburg in April 2007, it made sense to show the revue at the anniversary celebrations of the two universities. Thanks to the excellent coordination of Dr Phillip Collister and Dr Leneida Crawford from Towson University and the financial support of the Presidential Board, the Institute of Music and the University Society, this idea could be realised.

In the performance on 5 October in the "Center for the Arts" at Towson University, 58 students from Oldenburg and Towson sang the finale from Franz Waxman's "The Song Of Terezín" together in the second part of the revue in memory of over 1.5 million children who were killed in the concentration camps during the Second World War.




The visit to the theatre play "A Shayna Maidel" at the Rep Stage in Columbia about the fate of a Jewish family, followed by a discussion with the director and the actors, gave the students further insights into the fate of Jewry in Europe.

In addition to the rehearsals for the revue, there was a joint concert evening for the students from Towson and Oldenburg. The Oldenburg students also had the opportunity to participate in courses offered by the Department of Music. Fred Ritzel and Peter Vollhardt gave a lecture on the genesis of the project, the biographies and the significance of the composers from the revue. Silja Stegemeier offered a workshop on the interpretation of classical and romantic German songs and Peter Vollhardt rehearsed a four-part choral movement by the Comedian Harmonists with all participants (students and teachers).

A joint music theatre project was agreed between the teachers of both universities for 2010; a bilingual production that deals with globalisation, power and its abuse and the consequences of a world that is not in balance.

After their stay in Towson, the Oldenburg group travelled to New York for four days and visited the Kurt Weill Foundation and the Department of Music Education at New York University.