Volume 23 Number 1 topical Weill Spring 2005 A supplement to the Kurt Weill Newsletter Weill/Brecht Works Take the Stage. &news events A bevy of productions of Weill’s collaborations with Bertolt Brecht are in the works, partially inspired by the upcoming 50th anniversary of the death of Brecht in 2006. Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny is currently playing in Nuremberg, Darmstadt, and Pforzheim, and Harry Kupfer’s new staging of the work opens at the Dresden Semperoper on 6 May 2005 (Sebastian Weigle, conductor). In the autumn, addition- al Mahagonnys premiere at Theater Basel (Marko Letonja, conductor) on 14 September; on 12 November at Saarländisches Staatstheater, Saarbrücken (Leonid Grin, conductor), in a co-production with Stadttheater Ulm; and in Madrid at Teatro Español on 1 December. Two Berlin productions are planned: a revival of the 1999 Günter Krämer production at Deutsche Oper Berlin beginning 30 October 2005, and a new one at the Komische Oper opening in September 2006. Mahagonny will also Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill, ca. 1928 highlight the 2006 Kurt Weill Fest in Dessau. Spring 2005 and the 2005/2006 season are filled with productions of Die Dreigroschenoper worldwide. The work is ubiquitous in Germany, and U.S. outings are led by a Broadway revival of The Threepenny Opera scheduled by the Roundabout Theatre Company for early 2006. Directed by Scott Elliott, the Roundabout production will feature a new translation by Wallace Shawn. An increasing number of North American opera companies are choosing the work: after recent productions at Opera Omaha and Vancouver Opera, future venues include Long Beach Opera (11–15 June 2005), Arizona Opera (premiere 11 November 2005), and Opera Columbus (13–15 January 2006). A bumper crop of stagings in Eastern Europe provides the opportunity to see Peachum’s band of beggars in Wroclaw, Warsaw, Krakow, and Bialystok, Poland; Ostrava and Uherske Hradiste, Czech Republic; Belgrade, Serbia; Varazdin, Croatia; and Budapest, Hungary. Canada’s Shaw Festival revives its 2003 production of Happy End 15 May–28 October 2005; the work has also been seen recently in Dessau (review on page 20), Los Angeles, Vienna, and at the Teatr Narodowy in Warsaw. Peter Ludwig conducts and Hans Peter Cloos directs Die sieben Todsünden with Meret Becker, soprano, in a French stage production playing 10–21 May 2005 at MC2, Grenoble, and moving to MC93, Bobigny, 24 May–12 June. In upcoming concert performances of the Sins, Yakov Kreizberg conducts the Vienna Symphony (29–30 May 2005), Lawrence Foster the Munich Radio Orchestra (16 October 2005), and Stefan Sanderling the Florida Orchestra (Clearwater, 22–23 October 2005; Tampa Bay, 24 October 2005). And Weill Without Brecht Opera North’s hit production of One Touch of Venus (reviewed on page 18) tours to Italy for performances at the Ravenna Festival on 15, 17, and 21 July 2005. Plans are underway for a residency at Sadler’s Wells Theatre, London, in November 2005. Not one but two record- ings of both of Weill’s symphonies are due out this year. Marin Alsop leads the Bournemouth Symphony on a Naxos disc, also including Robert Russell Bennett’s Symphonic Nocturne based on Lady in the Dark; and Antony Beaumont conducts the Deutsche Kammer- philharmonie Bremen on Chandos (with Weill’s Quodlibet). After a successful five-month New York run in 2004, Bebe Neuwirth’s Weill revue, Here Lies Jenny, moves to the Post Street Theatre in San Francisco for a three-week run in May 2005. Jerry Orbach (20 October 1935–28 December 2004) Weill and Lenya with Wooly Theater, movie, and television fans alike mourned the death of Jerry Orbach, who died on New Weill/Lenya Musical December 28 at the age of 69. Orbach’s career took off when he was cast in 1955 as the Street Singer in the Theater de Lys production of The Threepenny Opera. He was also an In an interview with Broadway leg- understudy for Mack and eventually went on to play the role opposite Lotte Lenya dur- end Harold Prince, on 28 November ing his three and a half years with the show. Other notable musicals in which he starred 2004 Martin F. Kohn of the Detroit included Chicago, Guys and Dolls (both of which earned him Tony nominations), The Free Press reported that Prince’s next Fantasticks, 42nd Street, Carnival!, and Promises, Promises, for which he won a Tony project, in collaboration with Parade award. A presence in theater for years, Orbach gave more performances on Broadway than playwright Alfred Uhry, is “a musi- any other male actor in history. While his career focused on television and movies in his cal based on the lives of composer later years, he did not entirely eliminate singing from his repertoire. In February 2000, he Kurt Weill and singer Lotte Lenya, returned to celebrate Weill once again, performing “Mack the Knife” at a Brooklyn who were husband and wife.” Academy of Music gala honoring Weill’s centenary. 2a Volume 23, Number 1 Topical Weill 2005 Grants Awarded Two Footnotes to a Paris Research and Travel Concert in 1933 Hanna Höfer, for research on Love Life On 26 November 1933, a concert by the Publication Assistance Paris Symphony Orchestra premiered three songs from Der Silbersee in the Esbjörn Nyström, to publish doctoral dissertation entitled “Libretto in Progress: Brechts Salle Pleyel. During one of the songs, the und Weills Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny” French composer Florent Schmitt (1870–1958) got up and shouted repeat- College/University Performances edly “Vive Hitler!”, adding that there SUNY Potsdam, The Threepenny Opera were already plenty of bad French com- Lakeland College, Der Jasager posers and there was no room for all the Grand Valley State University, Street Scene Jews from Germany. The audience tried University of Redlands, Weill series including The Threepenny Opera, Der Lindberghflug, to drown out the protest. Newspapers and Kleine Dreigroschenmusik reported the incident in the following Morehead State University, The Threepenny Opera days. Schmitt, a Prix de Rome recipient, had close ties with the Nazis during the Professional Performances German occupation and held offices Chameleon Arts Ensemble of Boston, Frauentanz under the Vichy government. Opera de Camara del Teatro Colón, Die sieben Todsünden Opera North, One Touch of Venus In a newly surfaced letter from Weill to Arno Huth, a German musicologist and critic who resided in Paris at the The Kurt Weill Foundation for Music funds research and performance projects related to time, Weill urged Huth not to mention Kurt Weill and his wife, actress-singer Lotte Lenya. For each funding period, the “the silly Florent Schmitt scandal.” Foundation accepts proposals in the following categories: research and travel, symposia, Rather, Huth should write along these publication assistance, dissertation fellowships, college/university performance and pro- lines: “it goes without saying that a duction, recording projects, broadcasts, and professional performance and production. composer whose works are performed Grant guidelines, application forms, and further information on the grant program are all over the world can live and work available on the Kurt Weill Foundation website (www.kwf.org) or by telephone peacefully in Paris.” Apparently, Weill (212.505.5240). wanted to deflect attention from the scandal and avoid becoming a larger target for the Nazis and also for the Fascists, because, as Weill mentioned, 2004 Grant Recipient Report a performance of Mahagonny Songspiel and Der Jasager was scheduled at the news &news events Johnny Johnson Reprised by Boston Camerata in Sanders Theatre, Accademia di Santa Cecilia for 29 Cambridge (7 November 2004) December 1933 in Rome. The letter, dated “Louveciennes, 21 December “It’s not surprising the Boston Camerata revived Johnny Johnson. This little-seen 1936 1933,” is a recent gift from Huth’s son Kurt Weill anti-war musical has far more relevance today than when the group first Gerald Huth to the Kurt-Weill- mounted this concert version in 1996. Conducted by Joel Cohen, this fine, Gesellschaft e.V., Dessau. abridged version left one wanting to see the work in its entirety. Here the musical’s As of 1 January 2005, a prestigious scenes were suggested through the use of continuity spoken by Christopher Lydon, French high school in the small town and the use of an occasional prop or costume. It was in the numerous orchestral of St. Cloud, ten miles west of Paris, is interludes that Weill’s unique musical gifts were best realized. Cohen’s crisp leader- no longer called Lycée Florent ship served the composer’s idiosyncratic, bittersweet sound well. Now if only we could Schmitt. After years of debate about see the entire show.”—Robert Nesti, Boston Herald (9 November 2004) the Nazi past of its former namesake, the school decided to adopt the name “Although the play was given an elaborate Broadway production by the Group “Alexandre Dumas.” The school’s Theatre, the strengths of Johnny Johnson are firmly in its score, which is plaintive and principal, Bernard Gary, issued a stirring and shows Weill incorporating the joyous strains of swing into the elements he statement expressing relief that the brought with him from his Berlin kabarett days, the embittered yet still heartfelt reset- school can leave the debate behind and ting of Viennese musical traditions. In Johnny Johnson, you can hear Richard Strauss focus on education. According to vari- embrace Benny Goodman, and some of the songs—‘Song of the guns’ and the tender, ous newspaper reports, the school ironic ballad ‘Mon Ami, My Friend’ and the finale, ‘Johnny’s Song,’ with its hobbled (both students and faculty) had fairground beat—are among Weill’s very best. The Boston Camerata cast—11 singers favored the change for some time but and 11 musicians—performed the score with full attention to its emotional richness met resistance from the municipality.