Nelly Ben-Or

Nelly Ben-Or in 2008

Nelly Nechama Ben-Or, also known as Nelly Ben-Or Clynes, was born in 1933 in Lwow in Poland. She is an international concert pianist and a Professor at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama where she has taught the piano and the Alexander Technique since 1975. She is also a Holocaust survivor.

The Holocaust

Separated from the sister, who went into hiding and who found employment as a domestic servant, Ben-Or and her mother pretended to be Roman Catholics and travelled to Warsaw where the mother worked for a Christian family for a year as a maid. Having missed the last passenger train to Warsaw, the German Station master put them on a train reserved for German Army officers. The family in Warsaw paid for Ben-Or to have piano lessons along with their own daughter. Occasionally, when people suspected they were Jews, they would be forced to move on, but managed to escape.[1] They were reunited with the sister after the War.

Ben-Or frequently gives talks about her experiences during the Holocaust.[2]

Musician

A distinguished pianist, and a senior Alexander Technique teacher (in 1963 she became the first pianist to qualify as a teacher of the Alexander Technique), Ben-Or is internationally acknowledged as being the leading exponent of the application of the Alexander Technique to piano playing, in which field she has specialised for more than thirty-five years. She gives master classes on the technique to pianists in many countries throughout the world.[3]

She has performed in concerts and broadcasts throughout the world, in recitals, with orchestra and in chamber music. Ben-Or has made numerous commercial and broadcast recordings, including for the BBC. These recordings cover music by a wide range of composers from the 18th to the 20th centuries.[4]

Moving to England in 1960, she met and married her English husband and later moved to Northwood in London.

In 1999, the Nelly Ben-Or Scholarship Trust was established, whose patron is Sir Colin Davis.[4]

References

  1. ↑ Nelly Ben-Or Clynes Story. Pub. by Northwood and Pinner Synagogue (2008)
  2. ↑ The Enfield Independent January 28 2007
  3. ↑ Piano Courses and The Alexander Technique
  4. 1 2 Guildhall School of Music and Drama: Department of Piano Studies

External links

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