Ute Lemper sings The Seven Deadly Sins with the Philly Orchestra starting this evening, and I had a chance to sneak in to the rehearsal this morning, with a little help from Tom Baust, the oh-so-talented singer and pianist who is singing the baritone part in the male quartet in this piece. This is one of my favorite Brecht-Weill pieces, and we produced a stage version of it a UArts a couple years ago which got picked for the ACTF Region II Festival the year we did it. Lemper sings the piece auf Deutsch, natürlich, with fierce diction and insight born out of years of familiarity with the piece and its political heart. The Philly O was a little vague in their support, though I'm sure it'll be stronger once the customers arrive - the piece is full of musical drama, sudden dynamic shifts, startling colors and rhythmic textures that seemed a bit muddy in their rehearsal today. The quartet sounded solid and robust, and Tom and his compatriots deserve big kudos.
I'm a little dubious, though, about whether a presentation like this one really serves the piece. Weill and Brecht created the work for a ballet company in Paris, and the text and the music don't reveal the true fullness of their meaning without some sort of visual counterpoint. For the concert, the orchestra is projecting the translation over the stage, but the meaning of the text - as opposed to the translation of the words - doesn't reach the audience very forcefully.
Our production at UArts had the advantage of being sung in English - though there are instances when that's not even that much of a help for comprehension. Several of the quartet's movements are set in a contrapuntal style that renders the text (even in Michael Feingold's expressive, idiomatic rendering) fairly incomprehensible. We also had the advantage of Nancy Sanderson's performance as the singing Anna, a challenge which this student singing actress rose to with admirable aplomb. (Not that Nancy is a typical student singing actress - she brought tremendous maturity and insight to her work from the moment she arrived.) And because our production was staged, there were some visual cues to illuminate the drama. Because of physical and financial limitations, though, our production lacked the mise en scene that is required to tell the story, which depicts the two Annas' rise from humble origins in Louisiana to great wealth and fame before they return home to their family, richer but sadder and much wiser. The piece is an indictment of the price of ambition and the compromises one must make on the path to achieving success. It has, in other words, lots to say, and Lemper said it all very expressively in her reading of it this morning, but without the full theatrical works, its meaning is accessible only to those - like me - who already know what it's trying to say. Otherwise, it's a colorful curio, a showcase for the virtuosity of a singing actress blessed with prodigious talent and passionate insight.
The link above will lead to an article in the City Paper, in which Lemper talks about the piece and about her career. I adore her recording of the Berlin Cabaret Songs which she speaks of in this article, and recommend them highly. Her site at Decca Records has more information about her discography.