Shortly after the end of the war, Schoenberg presented the suffering and oppression of a whole people in his 99-piece monumental work. The narrative written by the composer describes the terror of the Nazi regime on the basis of a typical scenario in the Warsaw Ghetto. For the final part of the men's choir, Schoenberg draws heavily on the Jewish creed. The close relationship between music and text makes the work an important postwar composition, which is now also available as a study score.