Berlin musicals at La Scala
For Riccardo Chailly, Weill's three one-act operas give rise to an alternative form of musical theatre that is far removed from traditional operatic models and rich in experimentation, irony, and expressive depth.
ELISABETTA FAVA Maestro, it has been a long time since Kurt Weill has been featured at La Scala. Where did the idea of bringing him back come from?
RICCARDO CHAILLY It actually comes from way back: my love for Kurt Weill dates back to 1971, when Gisela May came to La Scala with the Berlin Deutsche Oper orchestra to sing a selection of Songs from Happy End, from The Threepenny Opera and from Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny; then after the interval they performed The Seven Deadly Sins in its entirety. Gisela May was considered the natural heir to Lotte Lenya, and I was so inspired by that performance that I started studying and listening to Weill the very next day. I then conducted the Concerto for Violin and Wind Instruments, which dates from 1925, the Berliner Requiem from 1928, and several times the suite from TheThreepenny Opera (the so-called KleineDreigroschenopermusik), for wind instruments only. In 2021, we had planned a double bill of The Seven Deadly Sins and Mahagonny-Songspiel at La Scala, but due to the pandemic, it was only broadcast on the Rai5 channel to an empty theatre. It was such a formidable experience that we decided to revive it with an audience in the theatre, but I wanted to add Happy End, which is too little known, I think it is important to bring these three scores together. Irina Brook has rethought the whole thing so that The Seven Deadly Sins and Mahagonny are linked in a 'first' act, about an hour of music; after the interval, Happy End remains, which lasts about 50 minutes on its own. It is not a chronological sequence, because we start from the last, with Seven Sins, which dates from 1933, on the eve, so to speak, of Weill's departure for the United States (and in fact you can hear that it has a more evolved language). Then we continue with Mahagonny-Songspiel, which was the first, from 1927, to then close the evening with Happy End, 1929, which has never been staged at La Scala.
EF Originally, Happy End was actually part of a comedy. How did you solve this problem?
RC I asked Irina to tell a story within these 50 minutes of music, making speech unnecessary, as it would have lengthened the piece too much. In the edition we are presenting, several previously unpublished instrumental passages have been reintegrated, which the Kurt Weill Foundation provided us with. We then decided to conclude Happy End by adding “Youkali,” a purely orchestral tango-habanera that Weill composed in 1934 (while still in Paris) for Marie Galante. The French lyrics were added only in 1935 by the writer Roger Fernay; they speak of Youkali, an island of dreams that no one can reach. The idea of a utopian place of happiness and well-being remains suspended; indeed, even the harmony remains suspended, and particularly ambiguous. Happy End ends with a seventh built on F, over which the trombone superimposes a long E flat, while the vibraphone plays C-E flat. It is a typical Weill epilogue, also found in Mahagonny, which nevertheless harmoniously returns to the tonic. The ability to superimpose different planes also reminds me very much of Shostakovich, always poised between emotion and derision.
EF There are often marches, toy soldiers with their shrill trumpets: does this seem like a Mahlerian legacy to you?
RC I would say they come more from Hindemith; they remind me of certain passages in Weber's Metamorphosen, also because of the similarity in orchestral colour, even though Hindemith works with a symphonic ensemble, while Weill remains focused on the ensemble. In Weill, I hear the kind of sound and rhythm of Hindemith's Kammermusiken, which, along with Křenek, played a leading role in the Berlin music scene of the 1920s. A major reason for his appeal lies precisely in his ability to link modernity to the sound of the ensemble. This was already present in 1934 in Marie Galante and would later be the basis for his success on Broadway.
EF So, inspired by Berlin cabarets, Weill was already creating German musicals in the late 1920s?
RC Yes, so much so that the dance music played in Berlin cabarets is a common and fundamental element of these scores: in Happy End, we find a very long tango, two blues, two waltzes, and two foxtrots. However, even more than the references to specific dance rhythms, I think swing is fundamental. The singing is always doubled by the ensemble, but its line must not be 'metric' as in a Hindemith score; it must revolve around the orchestra with flexibility, without ever straying from the rhythm, a flexible but not arbitrary interpretation. To get into the spirit of these works, I think it is essential to study the discography left by Lotte Lenya, which teaches us about the stylistic culture, the choice of tempos, and the tradition of added fermatas or unwritten rallentandi.
EF The wording of the text also plays a part in these choices, doesn't it?
RC Absolutely. Brecht's text is always effective, and the voice must be able to sculpt it through melody. Weill has the gift of extracting the vocal curve from the veins of the phrase. Beyond the words and the music, then, there is movement, this requires singer-actors, and in fact Irina Brook works precisely in this way, with a cast that is perfect in terms of spontaneous gestures.
EF Alongside the solo singing, these scores feature equally interesting polyphonies.
RC They are also very modern in their rich harmonic discourse, as can be seen in many passages: the modernity of the vocal quartet (all male) in Seven Sins, or passages such as the beginning of the third song in Mahagonny-Songspiel, when, above the tango rhythm of the ensemble, the voices take another direction and border on atonality. There are also some very unusual inventions in the most famous pieces, such as 'Alabama Song', also in Mahagonny, where at a certain point the singing turns into a canon duet between the two women, or the use of blues in a six-part piece such as 'Benares Song', which is then interrupted by a violent rhythm evoking an earthquake.
EF Weill also uses interludes, which were a feature of early 20th-century musical theatre, from Hindemith and Berg to Janáček and Shostakovich; thus, the “small ensemble” does no more and no less than a large orchestra would do.
RC It is part of his objectives, but at the same time he rethinks its character. Just think of the opening of Seven Sins, with two clarinets in upbeat, which must evoke that nostalgic Echoton that was typical of Weill. They must not be a rigid march. Moreover, Seven Sins has a larger ensemble (about 40 players), which carves out many symphonic passages, even detached from the voices (the tarantella in the second movement, for example); Mahagonny-Songspiel and Happy End, on the other hand, adopt the true sound of cabaret. Our orchestra is very good at changing its skin and immersing itself in this world. It benefits here from its familiarity with the music of Nino Rota, because it finds something of him in Kurt Weill, even though there are 40 years between the two composers. In Marie Galante there is a light, distant march that almost anticipates the ironic marches of Otto e mezzo, and there are truly many coincidences, however unintentional.
EF Scenic cantata, ballet-opera, Songspiel: each time, the form of these one-act works is defined with different and new terms.
RC While The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny is a true opera in three acts, with a lyrical cast, in these one-act works Weill wanted to take advantage of their brevity to create an alternative form of musical theatre, inspired by cabaret. It is not easy to find the right tone; there are beautiful interpretations of 'Youkali', for example, but from the point of view of an opera singer, not a cabaret singer; and Weill wanted cabaret, as Lotte Lenya teaches us.
EF It can't be easy to coordinate the orchestra and the voices, which have to interact very closely in these scores.
RC On a stage as large as La Scala, you have to avoid the risk of dispersion in this case. So, we raised the orchestra pit by about 40 centimetres so that everyone (the performers, but also the audience) can see and hear each other better. This improves the sound, but also direct contact, which helps with the continuous doubling of voices in the orchestra that we were talking about. In fact, in agreement with Irina, we have removed the prompter's box to create a Brechtian stage and stay as close as possible to the proscenium. This helps my connection with them, the singers' connection with the ensemble and, of course, the connection with the audience. Greater proximity ensures greater involvement and mutual listening.
Elisabetta Fava
Professor of Music History at the University of Turin, she is a scholar of Lied and German musical theatre. She regularly collaborates with the Publishing Office of La Scala Theatre.