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Remembering Weimar 1919-1933

The brilliant but doomed German republic evoked in readings of Kästner, Brecht and Alfred Doblin read by Sheila Atim and Philip Franks. Music by Dietrich, Eisler and Schoenberg.

The Weimar Republic may barely have spanned fifteen years from the adoption of a new German constitution in August 1919 (following the abdication of the Kaiser in November 1918) to the beginning of 1933 but there can rarely have been a more disturbing and yet thrilling period in Germany’s history. Political turbulence and violence were matched by radical developments in the arts and a new kind of sexual candour. Germany’s military was still smarting after defeat in the First World War but that conflict’s violence seemed to have found a fresh outlet in social and political upheaval. As the demand for war reparations began to bite the economy collapsed; housewives found that they needed barrow loads of cash to buy their groceries and by 1933 there were six million people out of work. At the same time, and maybe in part, because of the hardship and social turmoil, cabaret culture flourished; ragtime took over from the waltz; Berg and Schoenberg forged a new musical language; Brecht began to create a revolutionary theatre; Dada was born; the satire of Otto Dix and George Grosz sharpened its claws; Alfred Doblin and Robert Musil wrote books that would become landmarks of modernist fiction; and the Bauhaus, through its teaching as well as its practice, began to transform our understanding of architecture and design.
This edition of Words and Music with Sheila Atim and Philip Franks is about the historical Weimar, of course, but it’s also about how we continue to think about Weimar.

You'll be introduced to the quintessential Weimar woman – Vicki Baum’s ash blonde, Ypsi Lona, as well as to the emblematic figure of Moosbrugger, the murderer who haunts Musil’s novel, The Man without Qualities. The artist George Grosz gives a first-hand account of what it was like to live in Weimar’s capital, Berlin and we hear one of the pieces dedicated to him by the Dadaist composer, Erwin Schulhoff. There’s also an encounter with one of the very first examples of Schoenberg’s twelve tone composition and a chance to hear soprano Barbara Hannigan’s Berg- like account of Gershwin’s But Not for Me , recorded just a couple of years ago. Berg and Gershwin admired each other’s work and actually met in Vienna in 1928 so the affiliation is historical as well as aesthetic. Berg figures in his own right too, of course, with extracts from his two great prophetic operas, Lulu and Wozzeck. You’ll find more links between Weimar and the myth of Weimar in two famous film performances – Marlene Dietrich’s cabaret number, Falling in Love Again, from Josef von Sternberg’s The Blue Angel and Joel Grey from the sound track of Bob Fosse’s Seventies classic, Cabaret.
As with the music so with the words..... take Marc Behm’s thriller, Queen of the Night from which I’ve chosen an extract. Its set in the Twenties at the height of the Weimar period but was published in America in 1977 – testament to the period’s way of jumping out of time. Chronology is also deliberately jumbled in the programme’s ending where the great star of the Weimar stage, Lotte Lenya, gives a twentieth century tone to the words of the nineteenth century philosopher, Nietzsche. It may be a hundred years since the establishment of the Weimar Republic but it seems somehow perfectly natural that many of the ideas and impulses of that time find echoes in the present as well as in the past.

Readings:
Ypsi Lona by Vicki Baum translated by Don Reneau
Moosbrugger by Robert Musil translated by Sophie Wilkins
A Small Yes and a Big No by George Grosz translated by A.J. Pomerans
Queen of the Night by Marc Behm
Going to the Dogs: The Story of a Moralist by Erich Kastner translated by Cyrus Brooks
Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood
Erinnerung an die Marie A by Bertolt Brecht translated by David Constantine and Tom Kuhn
First Dada Manifesto by Hugo Ball translated by Ralph Mannheim
What I saw: Reports from Berlin 1920-33 by Joseph Roth translated by Michael Hofmann
Berlin Alexanderplatz by Alfred Doblin translated by Michael Hofmann
What I saw: Reports from Berlin 1920-33 by Joseph Roth translated by Michael Hofmann
Vereinsamt Nietzsche freely translated by M Z Warley

Producer: Zahid Warley

1 hour, 14 minutes

Last on

Sun 10 Nov 2019 17:30
Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio 3

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Music Played

Timings (where shown) are from the start of the programme in hours and minutes

  • 00:01

    Die Krupps

    Stahlwerksinfonie A

    Performer: Die Krupps.
    • Our Choice RTD 19515392.
    • Tr1.

  • Historical headlines

    Historical headlines, read by Zahid Warley

  • 00:02

    Die Krupps

    Stahlwerksinfonie A

    Performer: Die Krupps.
    • Our Choice RTD 19515392.
    • Tr1.
  • 00:02

    Friedrich Hollaender

    Solang wir jung sind, madame

    Performer: Curt Bois.
    • Edel 0014532TLR.
    • CD2 Tr18.

  • Vicki Baum translated by Don Reneau

    Ypsi Lona, read by Sheila Atim

  • 00:07

    Kurt Weill

    Die Moritat von Mackie Messer

    Performer: Max Raabe and Ensemble Modern.
    • RCA 74321661332.
    • Tr2.

  • Robert Musil translated by Sophie Wilkins

    Moosbrugger, read by Sheila Atim

  • 00:11

    Erwin Schulhoff

    Foxtrott, one of the Pittoresken

    Performer: Steffen Schleiermacher.
    • MDG 6131158.
    • Tr7.

  • George Grosz translated by A.J. Pomerans

    Extract from A Small Yes and a Big No, read by Philip Franks

  • 00:15

    Weintraubs Syncopators

    Nimm Dich in Acht vor Blonden Frauen

    Performer: Weintraubs Syncopators.
    • Edel 0014532.
    • CD2 Tr12.

  • George Grosz translated by A.J. Pomerans

    Extract from A Small Yes and a Big No read by Philip Franks

  • 00:17

    Friedrich Hollaender

    Ich bin von Kopf bis Fuss auf Liebe eingestellt

    Performer: Marlene Dietrich.
    • EMI CDP7964502.
    • Tr1.

  • Marc Behm

    Extract from Queen of the Night, read by Sheila Atim

  • 00:20

    Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Die Zauberflote

    Performer: Claudio Abbado.
    • Deutsche Grammophon 002894775789.
    • CD1 Tr7.

  • Marc Behm

    Extract from Queen of the Night, read by Sheila Atim

  • 00:22

    Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

    Die Zauberflote

    Performer: Claudio Abbado.
    • Deutsche Grammophon 002894775789.
    • CD1 Tr7.
  • 00:23

    Erwin Schulhoff

    Sonata Erotica

    Performer: Ebony Band.
    • Channel Classics CCS9997.
    • Tr2.

  • Marc Behm

    Extract from Queen of the Night, read by Sheila Atim

  • 00:24

    John Kander

    Two Ladies

    Lyricist: Fred Ebb. Performer: Joel Grey.
    • MCA DMC1664.
    • Tr3.

  • Erich Kastner translated by Cyrus Brooks

    Extract from Going to the Dogs: The Story of a Moralist, read by Philip Franks

  • 00:29

    Paul Hindemith

    Overture to the Β“Flying DutchmanΒ”

    Performer: Buchberger Quartett.
    • Wergo WER61972.
    • Tr12.

  • Christopher Isherwood

    Extract from Goodbye to Berlin, read by Philip Franks

  • 00:38

    George Gershwin

    But not for me arranged by Bill Elliott and Barbara Hannigan

    Performer: Barbara Hannigan.
    • Alpha Classics.
    • Tr7.

  • Bertolt Brecht translated by David Constantine and Tom Kuhn

    Erinnerung an die Marie, read by Sheila Atim

  • 00:44

    Stefan Wolpe

    An Anna Blume

    Performer: Ensemble Aventure.
    • Ars Musici AM10712.
    • Tr17.

  • Hugo Ball translated by Ralph Mannheim

    From First Dada Manifesto read by Philip Franks

  • 00:52

    Arnold Schoenberg

    From Suite for Piano, Op. 25, Intermezzo

    Performer: Glenn Gould.
    • Sony Classical SMK62021.
    • Tr3.

  • Joseph Roth translated by Michael Hofmann

    Extract from What I saw: Reports from Berlin 1920-33, read by Sheila Atim

  • 00:55

    J Strauss II

    Perpetuum Mobile

    Performer: Comedian Harmonists.
    • Avid AVC810.
    • CD2 Tr3.
  • 00:58

    Die Krupps

    Stahlwerksinfonie A

    Performer: Die Krupps.
    • Our Choice RTD 19515392.
    • Tr1.

  • Historical Headlines

    Historical headlines, read by Zahid Warley

  • 00:59

    Die Krupps

    Stahlwerksinfonie A

    Performer: Die Krupps.
    • Our Choice RTD 19515392.
    • Tr1.
  • 00:59

    Hanns Eisler/ Kurt Tucholsky

    Der Graben

    Performer: Ernst Busch.
    • Eterna.
    • 8.

  • Alfred Doblin translated by Michael Hofmann

    from the slaughterhouse chapter of Berlin Alexanderplatz read by Philip Franks Duration: 00:02:40

  • 01:05

    Alban Berg

    From Lulu

    Performer: Teresa Stratas with the Orchestre de LΒ’Opera de Paris.
    • Deutsche Grammophon 4636172.
    • CD3 Tr14.

  • Joseph Roth translated by Michael Hofmann

    Extract from What I saw: Reports from Berlin 1920-33 read by Philip Franks

  • Nietzsche freely translated by M Z Warley

    Extract from Vereinsamt, read by Sheila Atim

  • Nietzsche in German ( Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Archive)

    Vereinsamt, read by Lotte Lenya

  • Nietzsche freely translated by M Z Warley

    Extract from Vereinsamt, read by Sheila Atim

Broadcast

  • Sun 10 Nov 2019 17:30
    Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Radio 3

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