Jewish displaced persons in Berlin boycotted last week a concert given by Yehudi Menhuin, well-known American violinist, especially for the DP’s, it was learned today. Although his other concerts here were jampacked and received with tremendous enthusiasm by the occupation forces and the Germans alike, the auditerium was three-quarters empty when Menhuin played for the DP’s. Out of 6,000 Jews in the city, only about 250 showed up and nearly half of these were children.
Leaders of the DP’s said they had boycotted the concert because Menhuin has given several benefit performances for Germans, including one for a fund to buy instruments for the Berlin Philharmonic and the other for infantile paralysis victims. The violinist is reported to have visited the largest DP camp here after the boycotted concert and attempted to explain that for him music was “international.” The DP’s are said to have replied that they would not sanction anything which meant direct aid to Germans who had slaughtered their kin and who were still anti-Semitic.
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