The author was a radio and concert-pianist and held a State-Diploma as a teacher of music at the start of the persecution, which deprived him of one source of income after the other. He went to Antwerp, but after a stay of six months, had to leave Belgium. He returned to Berlin, the only other alternative being Austria, where he had experienced antisemitism, already many years before (p.1).

In Berlin, he worked for the Jüdische Kulturbund (p.1-2) and the Künstlerhilfe and thanks to his Austrian passport could go on concert-tours abroad.

Anti-Nazi Germans: The renowned singer Burchard Kaiser, in possession of the Goldenes Parteiabzeichen, would sing Schumann-Heine-Lieder telling the ignorant audience, that the poet was unknown. An innkeeper who put the anti-Jewish sign in a more hidden place (p.5).

Since 1939 the author has lived as a musician in England. In 1940, he married singer Johanna Metzger, late of Berlin whose father had been deported in connection with the Polenaktion, but could join his family in London, in the year 1939.