MembersBeating Antisemitism With a Drum

I can’t call Saul a Holocaust survivor because survival is about staying alive. At 95, Saul Dreier is more alive than most at any age, and enlivens anyone who has the chance to be around him. It is impossible to be in the company of this soon to be centenarian without being infected by his gusto for life and living.

I asked him the secret of his happiness, and here’s how he tells it.

“Five years ago, I woke up and read an article about a 108-year-old Holocaust survivor playing the piano. She reminded me of my time in the Theresienstadt death camp. The Nazis were trying to fool the world by making it look like a nice place to be. I was in barracks with a famous cantor and he was singing, so I got two spoons to clap along with him. I was 14-years-old. When you play music you forget you are hungry.

“I decided on the spot to put together a Holocaust survivors band. I woke up my wife and told her....