KURT WEILL NEWSLETTER PUBLISHED BY THE KURT WEILL FOUNDATION FOR MUSIC HENRY MARX, EDITOR FALL 1983 lishers and vendors throughout the world. performances, recordings, productions, he Presideut's My own research and performing ac­ workshops, fellowships, and scholar­ Column: tivities had to be suspended while I ships. Already the Foundation staff of doggedly learned about international Mrs. Symonette and Mr. Farneth, with the A PROFILE OF copyright laws, terminations, extensions, aid of a half-time secretary, are answering T the differences between small, grand inquiries and assisting scholars, perform­ THE FOUNDATION and print rights, performing rights so­ ers, conductors, and producers with vari­ It's hard for me to believe that Lenya has cieties, and the curious internal mecha­ ous projects. Now that the Foundation's been gone nearly two years. When she nisms of the "publishing" industry existence is secure and its role defined, asked me to succeed her as President of wherein few "publishers" actually print we are entering an exciting new phase of the Foundation, I had no inkling that music anymore. My naivete was neces­ activities. This is the first issue of a sem,­ these two years would be the most hec­ sarily short-lived as I reviewed contracts annual newsletter; 1984 will witness the tic. frustrating, rewarding and exhilarating and accounts that apparently had never publication of Volume I of a Weill Year­ of my life. Although it had been chartered been verified, much less audited. I would book; long-term plans are being formu­ nearly twenty years ago and had been hope that soon it will no longer be impos­ lated for publication, performance, or active sporadically during those two de­ sible to purchase or rent certain scores in recording of such "lost'' works as Der cades, the Foundation had been little this country because the U.S. rights had Kuhhandel, Die BOrgschaft, and The more than an umbrella for the tireless been ill-advisedly assigned to, and bur­ Eternal Road. efforts of Lys Symonette, who instigated ied with pop publishers. and that now None of the progress during the past many worthwhile projects and fielded the inquiries concerning rights for the entire two years would have been possible numerous requests for music and mate­ Weill catalogue can be answered with without the unselfish devotion of the dedi­ rials. Suddenly, after Lenya's death, the certainty by the Foundation so that no cated Board of Trustees. As we embark seven of us she had previously asked to one will be discouraged from perfor­ upon the second phase of this remark­ join the Board of Trustees, were faced with mances. This process has only just be­ able venture, I want to thank publicly Lys the awesome responsibility she had dis­ gun, and scrupulous administration of Symonette, Henry Marx, Milton Coleman. charged since Weill's death: to protect, the copyright catalogue will remain the Guy Stern, Hal Prince, and Julius Rudel promote, and perpetuate Weill's music. highest priority in this decade. for their efforts and support during this The first year was consumed by legal Currently the Foundation is making ap­ formative time. The list of others who battles. Although Lenya had specifically plication to the IRS to function as an nurtured our work is too long to include, bequeathed to the Foundation all royal­ "operating foundation." This will enable but the advice and c6ncern of Ronald ties and had named it the beneficiary of a us to engage directly in our mission: the Freed, President of European American remainder trust, her will made no mention promotion and perpetuation of the legacy Music, and David Drew cannot go un­ of copyright ownership or disposition of of Weill and Lenya. We are drafting pro­ acknowledged. My appreciation to all archival materials that weren't already on cedures for grants and awards to fund and hopes for a long and fruitful associa­ loan at Yale. Finally in August 1982, the research and editing projects, special tion in the pursuit of our common goals. New York Surrogate's Court decreed the Kim H. Kowalke Foundation heir to all copyrights that REHEARSING "KNICKERBOCKER Lenya had owned and awarded it the HOLIDAY": Kurt Weill at the piano with (f. I. tor.) Walter Huston, remaining archival materials. Jane Madden and This enabled us to work out a compre­ Maxwell Anderson hensive archival agreement with Yale, whereby it would house, catalogue, and service a Weill-Lenya Archive containing nearly all of the original documents, with the exception of visual and audio-video materials. The Foundation established a Research Center and Business Office in New York City that will house photo­ copies of materials at Yale, and other collections, an audio-video and oral his­ tory archive, and satellite references for Weill-Lenya research. We were fortunate that David Farneth agreed to join us as Archivist in April 1983, and we look for­ ward to the official opening of the facility in Lincoln Towers on November 1. As a neophyte in the business of mu­ sic, I was overwhelmed by the overlap­ ping, often ambiguous, sometimes only verbal, always confusing maze of assign­ ments and contracts with nearly fifty pub- "September Song " became so popular omethiHg Was that the people who came to see HterHatiCHal weill Added to "Knickerbocker Holiday" insisted on CoofereHCe aHd hearing the melody again at the curtain "September Soo(' call. Since Huston was loath to repeat the Festival at Yale S same lyrics, Anderson wrote a second 1 Recently biographies of two of Kurt Weill's chorus which is not contained in the Starts Nov. 2 collaborators have been published printed version of either book or score. It Sponsored jointly by the Kurt We!II Foun­ Langston Hughes (lyrics for "Street . goes as follows: Scene") is the subject of a book by Faith dation for Music and the Yale Un1vers1ty Berry, issued by the Lawrence Hill Co. 1n But it's a long, long while Music Library, an International Weill Con­ Westport, Cl It is more concerned with From May to December, ference and Festival will take place on the the life than the work of the black poet And you've won or lost Yale campus from November 2 to 5, 1983 to celebrate the opening of the Weill/ and sheds little additional light on his When you reach September. Lenya Archive at Yale. Critics, scholars, relations with Weill. Perhaps this will hap­ And I'm no cavalier, pen in a forthcoming second biowa~hy writers and performers from America,. For my gambling days are gone, Europe and Australia will congregate rn of Hughes, dealing exclusively with his For I've won my game. Harlem years, now being prepared by New Haven for papers, concerts, films, And the wine dwindles down receptions and a general exchange of Stanford Professor Arnold Sampersad. To a precious brew, The "Street Scene" lyrics were written just ideas on Kurt Weill and Lotte Lenya. September ... November! before Hughes, after many disappoint­ Lenya bequeathed the manuscripts of ments in the "white" world, settled down And these few vintage years many of Kurt Weill's works and other . in Harlem. I'd spend with you; important documents to Yale Un1ve_rs1ty Of Alfred S. Shivers' The Life of Maxwell These vintage years and since her death, further matenals Anderson (Book and lyrics for Knicker­ I'd spend with you. have come to Yale through donations bocker Holiday and Lost in the Stars) the © Maxwell Anderson 1983 used wilh perm,ss,oo from the Kurt Weill Foundation. The Weill- stage director Joshua Logan says in the New York Times Book Review that the author "has caught Anderson as no one has and, in so doing, has added enor­ mously to !heater history:· Logan recounts in his review, a little more elaborately than in his own auto­ biography "Josh" (Delacorte Press, 1976), the genesis of the world-famous "September Song" in Knickerbocker Hol­ iday. According to Logan, it was he who convinced Walter Huston, after his name had been suggested by someone else, to take the main part of Peter Stuyvesant. But he made a suggestion: wouldn't it be possible to enliven the part by a song, preferably a love song, with the young girl. That became the "September Song" which, according to Logan, Anderson and Weill wrote within 24 hours, thus rivalling the time in which Brecht and Weill added the even more famous "Morita!" to The Threepenny Opera: this, too, because the actor who was to imper­ sonate Tiger Brown complained that he had nothing catchy to sing. But Logan adds something to our knowledge which, however, has more to HUDDLE IN BROOK HOUSE: Maxwell Anderson, do with Anderson than with Weill. The Lotte Lenya and Kurt Weill (from left to right). © 1983 The Kurt Weill Foundation for Music Lincoln Towers 142 West End Avenue, Suite 1-R Forthcoming Recordings from Nonesuch New York. New York 10023 Phone: (212) 873-1465 Two premiere Weill recordings are scheduled for release: BOARD OF TRUSTEES RECORDARE {1923) Tanglewood Festival Chorus Kim Kowalke, President (release: October, 1983) John Oliver, conductor Henry Marx, Vice President Lys Symonette, Secretary STRING QUARTET IN B MINOR (1918) Sequoia String Quartet Milton Coleman, Treasurer STRING QUARTET NO 1, OP 8 (1923) Harold Prince (release: early 1984) Julius Rudel Guy Stern Design· Creative Images In Inc. he Archivist's Weill and Poulenc are wrdely admired, and Indeed loved, despite having been written off Report: re_gu/arly by progressive musicians as "reactionary" composers, dealers In easy musical tncks, pandered_ to debased popular tastes. The influence of the post-Rite Stravinsky WEILLILENYA marks their music from the start, but so does the cabaret idiom of their respective n countnes.