Lady in the Dark: Biography of a Musical

Book Description

When Lady in the Dark opened on January 23, 1941, its many firsts immediately distinguished it as a new and unusual work. The curious directive to playwright Moss Hart to complete a play about psychoanalysis came from his own Freudian psychiatrist. For the first time since his brother George's death, Ira Gershwin returned to writing lyrics for the theater. And for emigre composer Kurt Weill, it was a crack at an opulent first-class production. Together Hart, Gershwin, and Weill (with a little help from the psychiatrist) produced one of the most innovative works in Broadway history. Though Lady in the Dark was a smash-hit, it has never enjoyed a Broadway revival, and a certain mystique has grown up around its legendary original production. In this ground-breaking biography, bruce mcclung pieces together the musical's life story from sketches and drafts, production scripts, correspondence, photographs, costume and set designs, and thousands of clippings from the star's personal scrapbooks. He has interviewed eleven members of the original company to provide a one-of-a-kind glimpse into the backstage story.

Customer Reviews:

A book fit for a lady.......2007-06-10

I have so far only read half of this book and am thoroughly enjoying it. It is very detailed and the description of the opening night performance is fascinating. Those without a background in music may be a little put-off by how technically it goes into the music (I have a background in music and was still a bit confused). But, so far, so good. A great book for Broadway, Gertrude Lawrence, Kurt Weill, Moss Hart and Ira Gershwin fans, as well as those who want a good look into the puting of a Broadway musical in 1941.

Perhaps this book can spark a revival.......2007-02-14

I think that this is the most complete discussion of a musical show that I have ever seen. 'Lady in the Dark' is certainly worthy of study. It was a musical that broke new ground in theatre.

Mr. McClung begins with the first concept sketches for staging and costumes. From there it's on to discussion of the first drafts of the play, production scripts, and more on to final drawings for for the sets. With a cast of 101, it was a huge production with what was for then a sky high budget.

When it opened it broke new ground in that the leading lady (played by Gertrude Lawrence) is going through psychoanalysis.

Since its closure all three of the shows originators have died (Moss Hart, Ira Gershwin, Kurt Wheill). Their indivitual estates have rights to their particular parts of the play. It would be a major undertaking to put together such disparate people to revive the show. It hasn't happened yet. Perhaps this book will spark enough interest that a revival becomes possible.

The Bible of Lady in the Dark.......2007-02-03

For anyone who has an interest in the musical play Lady in the Dark, this book is a Bible of knowledge for the reader! McClung misses nothing and dissects the score, production, development and every nuance present in making a full diagnosis of this exceptional musical piece. The introduction, most notably, is one of the most impressive points, where McClung recreates scene-by-scene Opening Night of Lady in the Dark at the Alvin Theater (now the Neil Simon Theater) back in 1941. His insights and deep understanding of the plot, music and structure opens doors to how (and how not!) to update this piece for the current Broadway stage, which hopefully, this book will be the first step in the process. He also paints a lasting picture of one of the stage's most talented actresses, Gertrude Lawrence through interviews with the remaining living cast members of the original production and other sources.

In a personal review point, I thank McClung for writing this book, as Lady in the Dark has been a favorite show of mine for many years and I have always wanted to know more about it but the resources were scarce. With this book, almost every resource is there, and nearly every question answered. And even for those who don't know Lady in the Dark, this is the perfect opportunity to learn, and this book makes a precedent of how great musicals should be dissertated and studied.

A stellar piece of writing, a must read for anyone interested in the stage or musical theater history.

A fascinating book.......2007-01-29

Having no prior knowledge of "Lady in the Dark", I found this book to be incredibly well-written and informative. I have never read a biography of a show before, and it's a fascinating way to not only re-live the experience of 60 years ago, but to also learn the backstory of the show, its actors and creators, and the widespread effect of this ground-breaking musical on Broadway and society in general.

In one of my favorite chapters, Bruce McClung goes into incredible detail on the musical score, showing how virtually every note had a distinct purpose and was conceived to be an integral and vital part of the performance. Since this musical was written in a style completely different than those of its era, Bruce shows clearly that it wasn't just a coincidence that it worked so well; it was conceived to be vastly original. The other chapters of his book are just as exhaustively researched, with original photos, interviews and quotes from written and telegram correspondence, copies of the work during the creative process, and even tie-in merchandise.

This book is a truly remarkable look at this show and also how a major work of art can influence society and entertainment. One thing I found really interesting was the contrast between how actors and the entertainment industry responded during WWII, as compared to the actions of today's entertainers and celebrities during the current war.

Another fascinating aspect is that with the normal run of revivals of older shows, "Lady in the Dark" was too 'modern' to its era to be successfully revived without major overhaul. One more interesting contrast between today's society and that of the 1940s.

I hope that this book will generate interest in this show and introduce theatre and musical fans to an influential work, perhaps one that they are not familiar with. It is very well-written and although very detailed, it is presented in a way that kept my interest even in sections that I'm not well-versed on.

Kurt Weill / Songs Volume 2 - A Centennial Anthology

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Kurt Weill / Songs Volume 2 - A Centennial Anthology

Manufacturer: Warner Bros Pubns
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0769290469

Book Description

Volume 2 of this great 2-volume centennial tribute to one of the greatest composers of the 20th Century. From The Threepenny Opera to his Last Great Masterpiece Lost in the Stars. This volume contains 54 songs. Highlights include: Pirate Jenny * The Saga of Jenny * September Song * Sing Me Not a Ballad * Speak Low * What Good Would the Moon Be * cover graphics include original sheet music covers. Text contains bio of Weill and special introductory notes.

Kurt Weill - From Berlin To Broadway (Essential Box Sets)

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Kurt Weill - From Berlin To Broadway (Essential Box Sets)

Manufacturer: Hal Leonard Corporation
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0881883336

Product Description

A fabulous collection of this composer's songs, both from his German period and his later years in America. Features: Mack the Knife September Song My Ship Speak Low Lost in the Stars many more.

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yes, but . . .

Kurt Weill: An Illustrated Life
Jurgen Schebera
Manufacturer: Yale University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0300072848

Book Description

This engaging and lavishly illustrated book draws on a wealth of previously unexplored written and pictorial material to present an up-to-date and balanced biography of Kurt Weill, whose life was as rich and complex as the music for which he is acclaimed.

Customer Reviews:

yes, but . . . .......2005-06-20

Illustrated, yes. A life, well, seems like there's more to be told. Give this book's publisher 1 star, its author 2, and its translator 5. A smooth and seamless read, if not an altogether satisfying one.

Schebera does convey a sympathetic impression of Weill, and the illustrations offer a welcome insight into the historical context of Weill's music and how he was marketed. The difficulty is, none of the illustrated material is in color, a cost-saving move by the publisher that undercuts the value of the illustrations. Another shortcoming is that none of the discusion of Weill's music is accompanied by the music on the page.

Basically, this biography comes down to an itinerary of Weill's life with little said about what motivated and inspired the composer or how his creativity was stimulated and expressed. Remember, this was a man who was exiled from his native Germany in 1936, following the rise of Hitler's National Socialist Workers' Party, both because he was a Jew and also because he was regarded as a debaucher of German culture through his efforts to modernized classical music and opera.
Schebera is much better at placing Weill in a history-of-music context than at showing us what made the man tick. He unfortunately portrays a man whose life must have brimmed with emotional reactions to events occurring around him, from the creative explosion of the Weimar Republic to WWII to the Holocaust with a matter-of-fact detachment and, sorry to say, shallowness. Where this lack of emotional insight shows most notably is in Weill's personal relations. For example, he was married to Lotte Lenya twice, yet Schebera offers only a perfunctory and temporal explanation for their divorce and later casually glides over the motivations for their remarriage. His one telling quotation, Weill's remark from their first marriage, "Lenya, you know you come right after my music!" never gets the interpersonal embellishments one assumes is available in the voluminous correspondence between Weill and Lenya.

Weill also had an on-and-off creative relationship with Bertold Brecht whose ruptures Schebera summarizes under "creative differences" without elaborating. These artists, collectively with "Threepenny Opera" and individually or through other collaborations, are two of the most prominent and influential innovators in contemporary musical theater, yet Schebera treats their relationship and break-ups like a change of address or a scheduled vacation.

Behind this lack of detail, there seems to be an unstated assumption that the reader knows as much about the period and about the history of music as the author.

Not a book without merits, but certainly a book that leaves one hungry for more.

Speak Low (When You Speak Love): The Letters of Kurt Weill and Lotte Lenya

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Superbly Interesting Correspondence. Read it!
Remember Letters?

Speak Low (When You Speak Love): The Letters of Kurt Weill and Lotte Lenya
Kurt Weill , and Lotte Lenya
Manufacturer: University of California Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0520212401

Amazon.com

Different workplaces often kept Austrian singer Lotte Lenya and her husband, composer and conductor Kurt Weill apart, but the two shortened the distance through lively, often humorous correspondence. An unlikely couple, Weill came from an upper-class family and long line of German rabbis, while Lenya was the daughter of a washerwoman and an abusive cabby father. He studied with such masters as Ferruccio Busoni and Arnold Schoenberg; she worked as a child prostitute, dancer; and then singer, without any formal training. Despite their differences and numerous affairs they had profound affection and devotion for one another as this collection of letters, with annotations, explanations, and references by the editors, attests.

Book Description

They were an unlikely couple. Kurt Weill was a German cantor's son, cerebral, well-educated. Lotte Lenya was two years older, an Austrian Catholic coachman's daughter, waif-like, less than beautiful but always appealing to men. She survived the abuse of an alcoholic father, escaping to Zurich and finally Berlin, working as a would-be dancer turned actress. When they met, she was a domestic worker in the home of the playwright he had come to recruit as a librettist. Much to his family's dismay, they married in 1926.
Fiercely independent and yet codependent, Weill and Lenya spent twenty-five years discovering a way to live together after realizing that they couldn't live apart. Weill gave music to her voice, Lenya gave voice to his music. Their correspondence--first in German and later, after their move to America, in highly flavored English--is uninhibited, intimate, and irreverent. It offers a backstage view of German music and theater, the American musical theater in the late thirties and forties, and Hollywood. The letters are candid, vivid commentaries on world events, the creative process, and the experience of exile.
Never before published, this collection reflects the vibrancy of Weimar culture in the Golden Twenties and the vitality that èmigrès brought to American culture. Lenya's unfinished autobiographical account of her life before Weill is also included, along with a prologue, epilogue, and connective commentary. Immensely touching as well as informative, Weill and Lenya's letters preserve a portrait of a memorable love that somehow survived its turbulent surroundings.

Customer Reviews:

Superbly Interesting Correspondence. Read it!.......2007-08-29

`Speak Low (When You Speak Love) The Letters of Kurt Weill and Lotte Lenya' edited and translated by Lys Symonette and Kim H. Kowalke is the very first book of letters I have actually been able to read from cover to cover, and that includes attempts to read letters by some of my very favorite authors, such as H. L. Menchen, J. R. R. Tolkien, Ernest Hemingway, and Harold Ross (founder of `The New Yorker'), and all of these people, especially Menchen and Ross were no slouches when it came to writing correspondence.
Like Menchen and Ross, much of my interest in these two correspondents lies in their not being well known in the modern American pantheon of cultural heroes. I get a certain pleasure in `having them to myself', just as I felt some loss when Tolkien was elevated to that pantheon in the mid-1960's, when `The Hobbit' and `The Lord of the Rings' came out in mass market paperback.
Weill and Lenya was the model of a successful show business marriage, similar to that of singer Kitty Carlyle and playwright George S. Kaufmann, long before such pairings became staples of gossip columns and pop magazines and TV shows. To remind us of their background, Weill was the composer half of the team of Weill and Berthold Brecht who wrote three major hits for the Berlin musical stage in the late 1920's. The most famous became known to American audiences as `The Threepenny Opera'. Lenya, at this time, was a rising star actress and singer on the Berlin musical stage, and they were married on 26 January 1926, before Weill's first successes.
The book's subtitle does not make this clear, but all the letters in the book are between the two principals. There are no other correspondents. They run from 1924, when they first met, to about 15 months before Weill's death, dated 25 November 1948.
One may wonder how a correspondence between husband and wife could be so voluminous. Of course, their professions had a lot to do with it, since Lenya was often away from Berlin doing stage performances. Later, when the couple moved to the United States, the same condition held, as both were involved in different projects in different places.
What is surprising is that for all the parts Weill wrote for Lenya in Germany, he wrote no similar parts for her in his English musical plays such as `Lost in the Stars', `One Touch of Venus', and `Johnny Johnson'. I suspect the libretto writers such as Maxwell Anderson and S. J. Perelman had a far greater say in character development.
The editors have done a terrific job of assembling, annotating, and indexing all this material. The contents give a truly superb look at a major piece of the cultural history of both German and American musical stages in the first half of the 20th century. One envies their relationship and, like H. L. Menchen, who lost the love of his life, one is just a bit jealous of the fact that one can only live this relation vicariously.

Remember Letters?.......2007-04-02

Can you imagine a book subtitled: "The Email and SMS Exchanges of ____and ____?"
Remember letters? Actual pieces of paper held in and written by the hand of the sender? Remember the thrill of seeing the return address in the upper left hand corner, the familiar writing of a loved one on the front?
Kurt Weill and Lotte Lenya wrote each other almost every day they were apart. They are a veritable clearinghouse of the first half of 20th century history, having lived in Berlin of the 20's, Weill in French exile in the 30's then New York after that. It is a fascinating account--their impressions of Broadway and Hollywood are insightful (Weill) and hilarious(Lenya). Buy it. And write a letter to someone you love.

Kurt Weill - On Stage: From Berlin to Broadway

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Excellent Overview of Weill's Work for the Theatre
Inspiration for those who write for the musical stage
A Biography that focuses on Weill's enitre career

Kurt Weill - On Stage: From Berlin to Broadway
Foster Hirsch
Manufacturer: Limelight Editions
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0879109904

Book Description

His best-known song is "Mack the Knife," with words by Bertolt Brecht, from The Threepenny Opera, first performed in Weimar Berlin in 1928. Five years later, Kurt Weill fled the Nazis to come to America, where he soon emerged as one of the most admired composers of the Broadway musical stage. His shows included: Knickerbocker Holiday, Lady in the Dark, One Touch of Venus, Street Scene and Lost in the Stars. His songs: "My Ship," "September Song," "Speak Low" and "It Never Was You." This biography concentrates on Weill's career in the United States, but its aim is to explore the truth in the comment made by Weill's wife, the unforgettable Lotte Lenya: "There is no American Weill, there is no German Weill. There is no difference between them. There is only Weill."

Customer Reviews:

Excellent Overview of Weill's Work for the Theatre.......2007-04-11

Kurt Weill's career has been hotly debated for more than 60 years. The questions began while he was still alive: Did he sell out his German artistry for the crass commercialism of Broadway? Or did he only really come into his own when he was freed from European snobbery? The answer is that both opinions are somewhat true and somewhat false. Rather than treat Weill's work as two separate careers, a European one and an American one as most commentators seem to do, Foster Hirsch treats Weill's career as a single entity. Hirsch's KURT WEILL ON STAGE is a superb chronological overview of Kurt Weill's work for the theatre, showing the logical evolution of his work. Weill became a world famous celebrity by age 30 as a result of his sensational THREEPENNY OPERA and MAHAGONNY. With the rise of Hitler and the Nazis, Weill wisely fled Germany, ending up in America after a period in Paris. But could he succeed in a new country and a new culture? Many distinguished European artist-refugees of that period simply could not adapt and faded into obscurity. Weill determined that he could succeed by writing in an American idiom. He made the transition quite smoothly, creating a string of popular Broadway shows that spawned hit songs like "September Song" and "Speak Low" before dying of a heart attack at age 50. At the time of his death he seems to have been just another Broadway composer, but with the passage of time, Weill's reputation has grown and he is now recognized as one of the 20th Century's great composers. In Hirsch's book, Weill's American shows are revealed to be a continuation of the innovative thrust of THREEPENNY OPERA. Just as he had worked with the prodigy Berthold Brecht in Germany, in America he collaborated with the nation's most prestigious writers, including the Pulitzer Prize winners Paul Green, Maxwell Anderson, Ira Gershwin, Moss Hart and Elmer Rice. Among his other collaborators were Ogden Nash and a pre-MY FAIR LADY Alan Jay Lerner. He worked with such noted directors as Max Reinhardt, Elia Kazan and Josh Logan and choreographers George Balanchine and Agnes DeMille. Mary Martin had her first starring role on Broadway in ONE TOUCH OF VENUS. Gertrude Lawrence made a huge hit in LADY IN THE DARK, which also catapulted Danny Kaye and Victor Mature to fame. And of course, there was Lotte Lenya, the German star whose unorthodox marriage to Weill is still confounding to most people. She had affairs with members of both sexes before, during and after the marriage to Weill; He made no secret of his affairs with other women. But they had an unbreakable bond that went beyond sex. Lenya devoted her life to promoting his work after he died and achieved her greatest fame late in life.

Hirsch keeps his opinions of the work fairly restricted, which I appreciated. The only Weill score he really seems to denigrate is LOST IN THE STARS. (I have to agree with him, though.) This is not really a biography of Weill. The biographical aspects of the book are very sketchy. They are there to provide a context for the work. I enjoyed this book enormously and listened to all my old Weill recordings (and bought some new ones) during the weeks I was reading it. There will probably be a revival of interest in Weill with the arrival of the new Broadway show LOVE MUSIK, which deals with the relationship of Weill and Lenya. KURT WEILL ON STAGE provides an excellent overview of Weill's life and work that I would recommend to anyone interested in the subject.

Inspiration for those who write for the musical stage.......2006-05-30

Kurt Weill On Stage, a scholarly study published in 2002 by Foster Hirsch, is an outstanding overview of the theatrical career of one of the most talented and ambitious composers writing for the stage in the 20th century. Hirsch has access to the excellent materials of the Weill-Lenya Research Center and the support of the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music; he supplements the vast array of correspondence and interviews available to him with interviews and accounts of the creation of the works from participants and spectators. He writes compellingly about Weill's gifts as musical dramatist and collaborator. The book is utterly inspiring to anyone (like me) who has ambitions to write for the musical stage.

A Biography that focuses on Weill's enitre career.......2003-07-18

Too often, scholarly work on Kurt Weill focuses mainly on his German career in the 1920s-- "The Threepenny Opera," "Mahagonny"-- but Weill had a career that extended well into the 1940s as a Broadway composer, and Hirsch's book explores both aspects, although it is clear he's a fan of Weill's later American work.

I would recommend this book as a suppliment to Ronald Sanders' biography "The Days Grow Short," the standard of Weill biographies. However, Hirsch has access to different primary sources that Sanders did not have in the 1970s, and therefore can provide a different perspective. There is also a great deal of text devoted to Lotte Lenya, Weill's wife.

It has been criticzed that Hirsch's book deemphasizes musical analysis, which is true, but that is not the purpose. Analyse the music yourself or find the writings of Kim Kowalke for musical analysis.

Book Description

First volume of a fabulous 2-volume set of the songs of one of the greatest composers of the 20th century. From The Threepenny Opera to his final great Broadway show Lost in the Stars. Volume 1 contains 63 songs including: Alabama Song * Bilbao Song * Green-up Time * Here I'll Stay * It Was Never You * Lost in the Stars * Mack the Knife * My Ship and dozens of great songs from his early days in Berlin through Broadway and Hollywood Triumphs. Cover graphics include color photos of original sheet music covers. Text includes bio and introductory notes.

Customer Reviews:

The best collection of Weill ever!.......2005-09-29

This Anthology is a due tribute to the great songwriter, German-born Kurt Weill. His compositions include hits like Mack the Knife, September Song and Alabama Song - all of them obviously included in the anthology (but you have to buy both volumes!). The two parts of the anthology have each and every song by Weill ever published separately (ie. not as a part of a full musical score). What's more, the sheet music is an exact reprint of the original, which ensures that no alterations have been done - they are faithful to the smallest degree. Most are piano+voice scores, but some also include guitar chords. Some songs are in German, some in French and some in English. "Mack the Knife" both in the original Dreigroschen Opera German version and in the English one.
The books are quite thick (might fall down from a sheet music stand), but well-bound and not very likely to break or fall apart. Some biographical/background info is also included in both volumes, as well as a few black-and-white photographs.
All in all, the anthology is a small treasure and you'd be hard-pressed to find all the individual songs in any bookshop or any other edition. So if you love Kurt Weill's music (and can read scores), you'll certainly love this collection.

The Unknown Kurt Weill: A Collection of 14 Songs as Sung by Teresa Stratas

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Kurt Weill's songs are wonderful to sing-
did not recieve

The Unknown Kurt Weill: A Collection of 14 Songs as Sung by Teresa Stratas
Teresa Stratas
Manufacturer: Schott
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Teresa Stratas - The Unknown Kurt Weill

ASIN: 0769295134

Book Description

14 art songs dating from 1925 to 1944 as masterly performed by Teresa Stratas on the Nonesuch record. Includes: Berlin im Licht-Song * Buddy on the Nightshift * Es regnet * Je ne t'aime pas * Klops Lied * Nanna's Lied * Youkali (Tango Habanera) * and more.

Customer Reviews:

Kurt Weill's songs are wonderful to sing-.......2007-02-14

I've always wanted to learn some cabaret songs! These have an operatic or art-song flair, which I enjoy. They each tell a story, based mostly on what had taken place during the 1930's, in Berlin during the war era.
My vocal coach reccomended it to me, as part of my repertoire, and I can't thank her enough. The songs are in mostly German and French, with one song , "Buddy on the Nightshift"- in English.
I reccomend this book, if you want a change from singing traditional opera arias, but still want to sing in a operatic manner-and want to sing something with the cabaret sound, something that can be jazzy too.

did not recieve.......2006-02-28

I never recieved the actual songbook that I ordered. I recieved the cd a few weeks ago, but I never recieved confirmation on the book.

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Kurt Weill
David Farneth
Manufacturer: Overlook TP
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1585675776
Release Date: 2004-08-03

Book Description

Beautifully designed and lavishly illustrated, a large-format biography of one of the 20th century's most innovative composers The legendary iconoclast Kurt Weill has become figure central to the cultural life of the twentieth century. An artist known for his relentless exploration of the boundary between "high" and "low" art, Weill left behind a treasury of classical music and unforgettable songs such as "Mack the Knife" and "Alabama Song." Working with Bertolt Brecht and others, he used musicals such as The Threepenny Opera to address the most serious of social and political issues. In a lavish style suitable the subject, Kurt Weill explores the author's life with more than 900 photographs, many in full-color, from archives in five different countries, and in-depth scholarship by Weil expert David Farneth, to form this essential addition to any theater or music lover's collection.

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Good intro to Kurt Weill

Kurt Weill: Composer in a Divided World
Ronald Taylor
Manufacturer: Northeastern University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Library Binding
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Kurt Weill

ASIN: 1555531474

Book Description

In this well-researched and balanced account, Ronald Taylor examines the emotional and intellectual forces that fueled Kurt Weill's unique contribution to twentieth-century music, tracing the shifting career of the enigmatic and underappreciated composer who was forced to trade Berlin for Broadway by the burgeoning Nazi terror of the 1930s.

Customer Reviews:

Good intro to Kurt Weill.......2005-06-24

This is a satisfying biography that offers a well-targeted look into Weill's personal, professional, and creative development and also provides insight into his nimble adaptations to the changing social and historical contexts of his lifetime. More than anything else, Weill emerges as a man of eminent adaptability, whether in the narrow sense of reworking his music on the fly to the requirements of a theater production or in the broader sense of understanding his historical milieu and adapting his entire approach to music to acknowledge what audiences would embrace.

Weill's ability to reinvent himself is at the core of the ongoing debate about his stature as a composer. Unlike the David Bowie's, Madonna's, Britney Spears, etc., etc. of the current era, Weill's reinventions were not based on image with the substance of the music remaining essentially the same. From the avant neoclassicism of his early symphonic compositions to the heady inventiveness of Weimar Berlin's cabarets and theaters, where he first tasted success with Dreigroschenoper (Threepenny Opera) to Broadway, Weill transformed his musical sensibilities from one musical genre to another, while still carrying forward his signature sound. Some saw (and see) Weill's ability to bridge a range of musical expression as an exemplary eclecticism while others regard it as a betrayal of his early talents.

Taylor's subtitle, "composer in a divided world," significantly zeroes in on what may well be the most salient factor in Weill's lifework: his ability to adapt successfully in varying circumstances. And as Taylor points out, success far more than fortune was what Weill sought. By and large he achieved it in whatever form of musical expression he attempted, from neoclassical symphonies to musical theater. The magnitude of that accomplishment is not lost here, but neither are Weill's missteps as he moved in new directions.

Taylor quotes from critics, contemporaries, collaborators, and Weill himself to provide a wide-ranging perspective on the composer, his musical ideals, and his career. In addition, observations on Weill's compositions are illustrated with snippets from musical scores.

Much changed in the world during Kurt Weill's brief fifty years in it (1900-1950), and Taylor does an engaging job of situating Weill's work in its historical context, which is helpful to understanding the changes Weill put himself through over the course of his career. That said, there are more than a couple of places where the author slips into some fairly dense discussions of aesthetics and music theory that lead off the narrative track. A small price, though, for a worthwhile read that offers sympathetic justice to its subject and an engaging narrative about a man who was far from flamboyant in his personal life for all the flash of a career in musical theater.

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