It’s been a Weill, and well worth the five-star wait
NewsFrom the Lebrecht Album of the Week:
Banned in Berlin and exiled in March 1933, Kurt Weill stayed for a while in Paris where he wrote a symphonic work to a commission from the Singer sewing machine heiress, Princesse de Polignac. The symphony was taken up by his fellow-exile Bruno Walter and performed three times in the Netherlands, but apparently nowhere else. It was not published until 1966 and remains an esoteric item, seldom performed or recorded.
The present release … is by some distance the best I have heard, elegantly phrased and chock full of show tunes from the Brecht-Weill playbook. What’s not to like?
Read on here.
And here.
En francais ici.
In The Critic here.
Played Weill’s 2nd Symphony several times….an impressive
experience! Tight, interrelated motifs, and a marvellously transparent orchestration….
Ah, yes…..a student of Busoni….THAT speaks
volumes. (Composition-wise, no doubt Busoni’s most famous
student.)
The Symphony was, like so many events in the trenches, a flutter-by…never seen before or since. (Like Martinu’s fabulous “Rhapsody Concerto.”)
NL is correct: the work never outstayed its brief welcome or was unpleasantly over-heated.
Great review. However, you’ll find the wonderful Jac van Steen is incorrectly identified as Jan van Steen in the full article.
I performed this symphony in a local youth orchestra in the early 2000s and actually heard the BBC Phil play it about 15 years ago live – so I would have to say it’s not really that rare at all – I seem to remember several CD recordings too 🙂
I have a recording of his Symphonies 1 & 2 with the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Gary Bertini (Argo LP ZRG 755)…will put it on my playlist.
Terrific music.
Quick research shows that there are numerous recordings, some even on YouTube.