Sasha Semenoff
Sasha grew up in a middle-class family. His father was a clerk at the Delka textile factory, his mother a housewife and his sister a medical student.
Sasha’s family was passionate about music and would gather around the baby grand piano when they celebrated family events. Sasha learned to play the piano by ear at the age of six. For his eighth birthday, his parents gave him a violin. He later picked up the mandolin as well.
Playing for Cukurs
Soon after the Germans invaded Riga, Nazi authorities seized Sasha’s family apartment. Herberts Cukurs, famed long-distance pilot turned Nazi collaborator and member of the notorious Arajs Kommando execution squad, took over their apartment. Cukurs forced Sasha to play the family’s baby grand piano while he entertained women and friends from his squad. Cukurs showed Sasha’s mother the list of people who had been killed by the Kommando. She discovered her husband’s name on the list.
When Sasha’s father was taken away, he showed the officers documents that he had served in the Latvian War of Independence—he himself was a Latvian patriot. It made no difference. They took him anyway.
On November 30, 1941, Sasha and his mother were evicted from Zaubes Iela 4 and forced into the ghetto. All Sasha took with him were a stack of family photographs and a mandolin.
Sasha and his mother were separated in the ghetto. Every day Sasha would give his mother a kiss through the barbed wire. After seven days, she no longer appeared.
Love was dangerous in the ghetto. In the summer of 1942, posters placed on every door stated that sex was forbidden. On Commandant Krause’s orders, sterilizations were performed on all women coming in for abortions. Krause further ordered anywhere from 10 to 25 lashes for the woman’s partner. If the woman refused to give up the name, Krause ordered her operation to proceed without anesthesia.
Two hearts separated by barbed wire
Despite the danger, Sasha fell in love with a girl named Rita. She was from Hannover and lived in the German section of the Ghetto. When it got dark, Sasha would sneak through the barbed wire separating the German and Latvian ghettos and spend the night with her.
Rita was killed in 1943
when the ghetto was liquidated.
A Second Life
After Sasha was liberated, he emigrated to the United States. He found his way to Las Vegas where he performed at Caesars Palace and The Dunes, playing with Barbra Streisand, Elvis Presley and Frank Sinatra.
A New Song
Friends of Sinatra claimed that Sasha was his favorite violinist. Many reminisce how Sinatra would bring Sasha to the blackjack and craps tables to entertain him while he gambled.
