Threepenny Opera
The Threepenny Operais Kurt Weill's most popular work. Its signature song, "Mack the Knife," is a cultural artifact, sung and played in virtually all musical genres. Many of us are permanently imprinted with Lotte Lenya'sSony recordingof the opera, so redolent of the decadent, world-weary spirit of the Weimar Republic. This new recording misses some of that spirit but has other, compensating virtues. One is the restoration of the original score in the new Kurt Weill Edition that uses the original instrumentation, adds or deletes numbers, and includes Bertolt Brecht's plot summaries prepared for a 1940 concert version. Other pluses include Max Raabe's oddly sympathetic Macheath and H.K. Gruber's Mr. Peachum, both well-sung characterizations, and Ensemble Modern's virtuoso performance, full of drive and enthusiasm. The sound is wide-ranging and impactful. With one exception, the rest of the cast ranges from good to acceptable. But punk rocker Nina Hagen's Mrs. Peachum is truly awful, with cackles and shrieks galore--a monumental piece of miscasting. So while this recording cannot displace the Lenya version, it's a welcome supplement, adding new dimensions to a familiar and beloved work.--Dan Davis