Ute Lemper--Seven Deadly Sins and Mahagonny Songspiel

I discovered Ute Lemper about the same time I discovered Kurt Weill, so I have forever linked them together--a problem which has probably followed Ms. Lemper for much of her career. I really like her singing of this material, though, and this recording of Weill's Seven Deadly Sins shows why.

Previously, I had watched a very bizarre and confusing film version of this song cycle or chant ballet as its creators called it. Without the distraction of visuals, I am reminded that the orchestra parts of these songs are great. At times powerful, driving and hypnotic, the orchestra parts are what drive this piece for me--as if the orchestra represents the world around the characters who are driven to make such difficult choices given their economic condition. It is as timely now as in 1933 when the work was written.

Ms. Lemper is a wonderful proponent of the work, with a polished (but not too polished) delivery. I love how she, at times, chews her German and spits it out. Lemper strikes the right balance for me between a Lotte Lenya type performance, with its cigarette and gravel, and a Anne-Sophie Von Otter type performance coming from the world of opera. Ms. Lemper has a strong chest voice which rises well into middle range. She seems to have a large break, however, and a smallish headvoice. Fortunately, this work doesn't require much singing in that range.

The Mahagonny Songspiel from 1927 is a collection of songs loosely strung together in a story. I've previously talked about the opera version of Mahagonny. I find the smaller version much more palatable and effective.

I realize in looking at the recordings in my own collection that I have not discussed yet, I have lots of Kurt Weill to go. I hope the singing is as good as that by Ms. Lemper and her Mahagonny cast.


The Seven Deadly Sins
Mahagonny Songspiel
Music by Kurt Weill
Lyrics by Bertold Brecht
written in 1933 and 1927, respectively
this performance released on London Decca Records in 1990
Cast: Ute Lemper, Berlin RIAS Sinfonietta, conducted by John Mauceri

The Seven Deadly Sins--film on DVD

I have had a love affair with Kurt Weill for most of my life, ever since I was in a production of Threepenny Opera my freshman year of college. It was wonderfully dark, and really appealed to my inner goth, which rarely appeared from underneath my outer Preppy. I'm not certain when I first discovered Weill's Seven Deadly Sins, but I have several recordings of it at this point. I've never seen it performed live, although I believe it has been performed at Orchestra Hall in Chicago sometime in the last decade. Imagine my thrill at realizing that there is a version of the work on DVD.

Sins comes from Weill's Wiemar era. Created five years after Threepenny Opera, it was Weill and Bertold Brecht's final collaboration. The creators call this piece a sung ballet, and while it may not be obvious what the piece is by those words, that is a pretty accurate description of it. More theatrical than a cantata. Not opera, although some of the singing needed is on that level, but a different sort of music theater. The cast includes a male vocal quartet, a singing woman (soprano or mezzo, as the work exists in two different keys), and a female actor/dancer.

While this production was co-produced by The Lyon Opera, this is clearly a version for television or film. There is much outdoor film footage edited in between scenes of the theatre piece. And while the theatre section of the work may be based on a stage production, it is filmed with too many close-ups to be a stage work in this version.

Director Peter Sellars obviously had many ideas about this work and its meanings, and he puts every one of them into this video version. I found the whole thing too cluttered with images and messages to take away much of anything. The editing is very quick, and all the performers are presented almost exclusively in close-up. Nora Kimball seemed underutilized as Anna II. I wanted to see her actually dance.

For me, this work is a discussion of whom is allowed the luxury of a virtuous life. Weill and Brecht clearly felt that only the rich could afford to steer clear of sinning. With a scene dedicated to each of the seven sins (sloth, pride, wrath, gluttony, lust, greed, envy), we see Anna I and Anna II--really a singer version and a dancer version of the same person--go from city to city trying to feed themselves and send something back home to the family.

The singing is first rate. Stratas (who became a bit of a Weill specialist in her later career) is particularly good--musical and still emotional. The male quartet sings very well, although is asked to do some ridiculous action. There are parts of the libretto that are funny for Americans to read. Neither Weill or Brecht had been to America, but each scene in Sins is set in a different US city, as the Annas make their way in the world.

I just read that there is a translation of the libretto by WH Auden. I must check that out.

Music by Kurt Weill
Text by Bertold Brecht
First performed in 1933
Lyon Opera television production created in 1993
Directed by Peter Sellars
Conducted by Kent Nagano
Cast: Teresa Stratas, Frank Kelley, Nora Kimball, Peter Rose, Howard Haskin, Herbert Perry