A black-and-white photograph shows 11 young Chinese boys in untucked shirts standing in a row, with a middle-aged Western man in a suit smiling behind them.

This image would lead Fang Sheng on a journey to uncover his father's musical past and the identity of the mysterious "Mr. Adler," — a Jewish refugee who fled to Shanghai during World War II to escape the Nazis.

In Finding Adler, we follow Fang as he pieces together how an orphaned Chinese child became one of the founding members of China's National Symphony Orchestra with the help of an Austrian violinist named Ferdinand Adler.

Produced by Sharon Wu and Liz Hoath / this documentary first aired on The Current back in 2018.

Storylines is part of the CBC Audio Doc Unit

The Vienna violinist who changed Chinese classical music