Wagner Concert Scrapped at Tel Aviv U.

By JTA June 5, 2012

Tel Aviv University put a stop to a planned concert of music by German composer Richard Wagner.

In a letter denying the request to hold the concert in a campus auditorium, the university said that Yonatan Livni, founder of the Israel Wagner Society, concealed the organization’s name and its desire to play Wagner when he requested last week to rent the auditorium, Haaretz reported Monday.

Wagner’s music traditionally has been boycotted in Israel. The forerunner to the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra stopped performing his music in 1938 following Kristallnacht.

Wagner, who reportedly held anti-Semitic views, was Adolf Hitler’s favorite composer.

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