Peter Lipa

* 1943

  • “Of course, my father had problems with that. We came from the so-called mixed marriage and my father was convinced that since he married a Christian and had a daughter from this marriage, who was older than I, born in 1937, that he would be immune against what was happening back then. For sure he was aware of it, but he thought he could not be endangered. Unfortunately, he only thought so. The truth was that when I was only one year old, suddenly, one nice day my father was taken to the Gestapo Headquarters. It was on the opposite side of the crossroad in one house, where they imprisoned him for two months. There he was waiting for further transport, which took him away sometime in the fall of 1944. He had to get on and was deported to Auschwitz.”

  • “My mom got really scared and she feared that they might want to deport us, the children, as well, since we were born in the mixed marriage. Simply, she just closed the shop and we disappeared from Prešov. There was she, her mother, my sister and I. We had to be separated for some time, too. She and my sister went somewhere to Tatry, but my sister Katka immediately found new friends there, so mom was afraid, someone could recognize them. She returned home and finally she and her mother decided, we would go to Kláštor pod Znievom, where we could hide. The religious sisters accepted us there as orphans. Actually, this place was like an orphanage house. Mom and grandmother stayed somewhere in the village and that’s how we lived through the last months until Kláštor pod Znievom was liberated and the war was over.”

  • “I think that when I was about ten – twelve years old, it became obvious that our father was a Jew, we were named Löwy after him, and he never returned from Auschwitz. So, I had realized it back then, but about 3 years later, when I was fifteen, I went to Auschwitz with a school excursion to learn about the history. That’s how I came to know the whole truth. Even though, long time after the war as a small boy I still lived in belief, that one day our father might be back. The people didn’t return, though, and in reality, we never actually knew if father had died. He was just declared dead. One of his colleagues, dr. Herberger, I guess his name was, witnessed at the court that our father was dead, so that my mom could receive some documents confirming these facts to live on without her husband. We stayed alone. Our mom never had any other partner or husband, so she raised us – my sister and me – by herself.”

  • Celé nahrávky
  • 1

    Bratislava, Slovensko, 04.06.2018

    (audio)
    délka: 01:38:48
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu Stories of 20th Century
  • 2

    Bratislava, Slovensko, 31.07.2018

    (audio)
    délka: 01:38:48
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu Stories of the 20th century
Celé nahrávky jsou k dispozici pouze pro přihlášené uživatele.

I haven’t emigrated mainly because of music

Portrait 2
Portrait 2
zdroj: pri natáčaní ED

Peter Lipa was born on May 30, 1943 in Prešov. During the era of the Slovak State, his father Mikuláš Löwy was persecuted for his Jewish descent, and when Peter was one year old, the father was imprisoned in Prešov Gestapo Headquarters. Later he was deported to Auschwitz and being only 40-years old, he died sometime around Christmas of 1944. Peter and his sister Katarína were hiding in a cloister of Kláštor pod Znievom, where the religious sisters accepted them as orphans. In 1949 he enrolled at the Santa Maria school in Prešov, then continued to study geodesy and surveying at the Košice technical school and, as a 19-year old, he applied to study economics and organization of building production in Bratislava. There he became fully devoted to music. During the socialism, he used to play also in the West through Slovkoncert music agency, but he wasn’t allowed to perform in Bratislava. He issued his first authentic album when he was 40. He worked as an editor of journalism in science and technology for the Czechoslovak Radio in years 1968 – 70 and 1972 – 77. He was a member of the bands like: Struny, Istropolitana, Blues five, HEY, Revival Jazz Band, Combo of Peter Lipa, and Lipa Andršt-Bluesband. He has been an organizer of the Bratislava Jazz Days and a founder of the first jazz school in Slovakia. Since 1976 he has been a freelance musician.