Kurt Weill (1900–1950) is unique amongst 20th century composers in being equally distinguished as an exponent of 1920s modernism and the writer of successful musicals. His life can be divided into two halves: one German and one American. Shortly after the Nazi party came to power, Weill was forced to leave Germany. After a lengthy unsuccessful period, he would eventually find a new artistic home on New York’s Broadway.
Weill was born in Dessau on 2 March 1900 and grew up in the household of a Jewish cantor. At the age of 21, he was accepted by Ferruccio Busoni’s masterclass in Composition in Berlin. Following some early successes with compositions in a style located in between expressionism and Busoni’s “young classicism,” in 1924, Weill was able to sign a contract with Universal Edition that guaranteed him a living. In the mid-1920s his work underwent a fundamental change. He now began to focus on music for the theatre, where he worked on a new style that was explicitly intended to be immediately accessible, incorporating reworked genres and elements of dance and popular music. In his collaboration with Bertolt Brecht on “The Threepenny Opera” in 1928, Weill achieved a landmark success.
As a Jew and an acknowledged proponent of unfavoured modernism, Weill was obliged to escape from Germany in March 1933. He emigrated first to Paris, but was unable to find his feet there. A trip together with his wife Lotte Lenya to New York in September 1935 provided the impetus to settle in that city permanently, where Broadway theatres possessed the infrastructure required for his idea of musical theatre. After taking a while to find his way, “One Touch of Venus” in 1943 brought him his decisive breakthrough. By the time of Weill’s sudden death in 1950, he had succeeded in contributing a significant new influence to this most American of art forms.
As of June 2023.