Tonight’s show revolves around Lotte Lenya and Kurt Weill, who were not overtly political in their public lives, but were both intimately linked to social issues due to their closeness to Bertolt Brecht and to the historical events they experienced – either close or from afar. We’ll hear Lenya reciting and singing lyrics by Brecht, and music from Kurt Weill’s Street Scene, Threepenny Opera, City of Mahagonny, and Knickerbocker Holiday. My two guests are both opera experts: Fred Plotkin, longtime commentator for the Metropolitan Opera in New York, and John Mauceri, multifaceted conductor and fellow Yalie.

Political lives, musical lives. A series on ten American musicians whose work was/is profoundly influenced by the forces of politics. This series grew out of a conversation I had a few years ago with composer, pianist, and improviser Donal Fox. Hence the inspiration for “Keys of Change.”

AMERICAN HIGHWAYS # 110 KEYS OF CHANGE – departing from Mahagonny

Theme Music 0.1

Charles Ives, arr William Schuman

Variations on America

The Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy

RCA Red Seal – SB 6798

Theme Music 0.2

Donal Fox

The Scream

Guy Livingston, piano

WERGO 6649-2

Kurt Weill, text by Bertolt Brecht

Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny:

1. Gesucht Werden Leokadja Begbick

6. Damals Kam Unter Anderen

7. Heraus, Ihr Schönen

8. Ach, Bedenken Sie [Lenya]

NDR Symphony Orchestra & Chorus Hamburg

M2K 77341

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Marriage of Figaro “Gente, Gente, All’armi”

James Levine, Metropolitan Opera Orchestra with Kiri Te Kanawa, Dawn Upshaw, Ferrucio Furlanetto

Deutsch Grammophon 431619-2

Ludwig van Beethoven

Fidelio, Op 72: “Gott! Welch’ Dunkel hier!”

James McCracken, Lorin Maazel, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra

Decca 448 104-2

Music by Kurt Weill, words by Bertolt Brecht/Marc Blitzstein

The Threepenny Opera: Ballad of Mack the Knife

Lotte Lenya, singer

Decca Broadway 012 159 463-2

Kurt Weill

Beat! Beat! Drums! (excerpt)

Helen Hayes, speaker; with Leroy Sheilds

GEMM CDS 9294

Kurt Weill

Schickelgruber

Teresa Stratas, soprano; Richard Woitach, piano

Rhino Entertainment/Nonesuch 79019-2

Kurt Weill

“How can you tell an American?” from Knickerbocker Holiday

Lotte Lenya

Bear Family Records BCD 16019

Kurt Weill

Marching Song/Second act finale/OneTouch of Alchemy/All Hail the Political Honeymoon: from Knickerbocker Holiday.

Maurice Abravanel, Walter Huston and Chorus

GEMM CDS 9294 Disc 1

Kurt Weill

Street scene: Overture and “Lonely House”

Dawn Upshaw & David Zinman

NONESUCH 79458-2

Leonard Bernstein

Overture to Candide

Leonard Bernstein conducts the New York Philharmonic

SONY BMG Columbia – R67-2868

Alex North

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Main Title (excerpt)

Alex North, Jerry Goldsmith, National Philharmic Orchestra

Varese Sarabande Records VSD-5800

Hans Eisler, John Willet, lyrics, orig words by Bertolt Brecht, trans by Eric Bentley

“Song of a German Mother”

Lotte Lenya

Bear Family Records BCD 16019 KL

Charles Ives

They Are There! (A War Song March) (arr. for Concert Band)

US Marine Band

Naxos 8.570559

 

Photo credit: Brock University Walker Arts Center production of City of Mahagonny in 2015.