Regenerated Music

As far as we know, no totalitarianism has given birth to long lasting works of art. If anything, there was a reaction: going against the tide, confronting the system, creators pushing the limit to the brink of the abyss. For some, such as Holländer, Weill or Spoliansky, artistic conscience sent them into exile. Others, like the great Viktor Ullmann, were condemned to the gas chambers of Auschwitz. Ute Lemper is the best ambassador of this art which the intolerant people of the world described as “Degenerate music” (Entartete Musik). Under this atrocious label everything born within the short-lived Weimar Republic was included. It was the soundtrack of a convulsive time that was culturally exciting.

However, the Weimar Suite goes beyond a concrete period in history. It brings together a fusion of music where a blurred fine line divides the highbrow from the popular: cabaret songs, street melodies, tango… Such a blend requires an unclassifiable voice, outside the range, and with a stage presence that recalls its natural habitat on the theatre stage. Only Ute Lemper, accompanied by the Real Orquesta Sinfónica de Sevilla, can be at the same time Marlene Dietrich, Lotte Lenya and Edith Piaf in this fiery song to beauty with a creative liberty which is as necessary today as yesterday.


Songs of Kurt Weill, Mischa Spoliansky, Friedrich Holländer, Leonello Castucci, Viktor Ullman, Astor Piazzolla, Michel Legrand, Edith Piaf