The Threepenny Opera is a 1928 German "play with music" by Bertolt Brecht, adapted from a translation by Elisabeth Hauptmann of John Gay's 18th-century English ballad opera, The Beggar's Opera, and four ballads by François Villon, with music by Kurt Weill. Although there is debate as to how much, if any, contribution Hauptmann might have made to the text, Brecht is usually listed as sole author.
Kurt Julian Weill was a German-born American composer active from the 1920s in his native country, and in his later years in the United States. He was a leading composer for the stage who was best known for his fruitful collaborations with Bertolt Brecht. With Brecht, he developed productions such as his best-known work, The Threepenny Opera, which included the ballad "Mack the Knife". Weill held the ideal of writing music that served a socially useful purpose, Gebrauchsmusik. He also wrote several works for the concert hall and a number of works on Jewish themes. He became a United States citizen in 1943.
"Mack the Knife" or "The Ballad of Mack the Knife" is a song composed by Kurt Weill with lyrics by Bertolt Brecht for their 1928 music drama The Threepenny Opera. The song tells of a knife-wielding criminal of the London underworld from the musical named Macheath, the "Mack the Knife" of the title.
Lotte Lenya was an Austrian-American singer, diseuse, and actress, long based in the United States. In the German-speaking and classical music world, she is best remembered for her performances of the songs of her first husband, Kurt Weill. In English-language cinema, she was nominated for an Academy Award for her role as a jaded aristocrat in The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (1961). She also played the murderous and sadistic Rosa Klebb in the James Bond movie From Russia with Love (1963).
Yiannis Chryssomallis, known professionally as Yanni, is a Greek composer, keyboardist, pianist, and music producer.
The "Alabama Song"—also known as "Moon of Alabama", "Moon over Alabama", and "Whisky Bar"—is an English version of a song written by Bertolt Brecht and translated from German by his close collaborator Elisabeth Hauptmann in 1925 and set to music by Kurt Weill for the 1927 play Little Mahagonny. It was reused for the 1930 opera Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny and has been recorded by the Doors and David Bowie.
The Seven Deadly Sins is a satirical ballet chanté in seven scenes composed by Kurt Weill to a German libretto by Bertolt Brecht in 1933 under a commission from Boris Kochno and Edward James. It was translated into English by W. H. Auden and Chester Kallman and more recently by Michael Feingold. It was the last major collaboration between Weill and Brecht.
Live at the Acropolis is the first live album and concert film by the Greek keyboardist, composer, and producer Yanni, released on March 1, 1994, on Private Music. It was recorded at the Herodes Atticus Theatre in Athens, Greece during his 1993 tour in support of his eighth studio album, In My Time (1993). The concert took a year and a half to organise and cost Yanni $2 million of his own money to fund. He performs with his six-piece band and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Shahrdad Rohani. The album was mixed and produced by Yanni in his studio, and was made into a television special which aired in the United States on Public Broadcasting Service (PBS).
"Pirate Jenny" is a well-known song from The Threepenny Opera by Kurt Weill, with lyrics by Bertolt Brecht. The English lyrics are by Marc Blitzstein. It is one of the best known songs in the opera, after "Mack the Knife".
20th Century Blues is a live 1996 album by English singer Marianne Faithfull, in collaboration with pianist Paul Trueblood.
"What Keeps Mankind Alive?" is a song composed by Kurt Weill with lyrics by Bertolt Brecht for their music drama The Threepenny Opera which premiered in Berlin in 1928 at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm. The title refers to the central line from the finale of act 2, Denn wovon lebt der Mensch?. In the opera, the two stanzas of the strophic piece are sung by Macheath and Mrs Peachum and the final line is sung in fortissimo by the chorus.
Liam Bonner is a retired professional opera singer (baritone) from Pittsburgh, PA.
September Songs – The Music of Kurt Weill is a music video of 94 minutes recorded in 1994 for Rhombus Media, ZDF (Germany), CBC (Canada) and RTP (Portugal). It was produced and directed by Larry Weinstein, and written by Weinstein and David Mortin. The film was conceived as a follow-up to the album Lost in the Stars: The Music of Kurt Weill whose producer Hal Willner served as the music supervisor in this project. The film was nominated for the 1995 Emmy Awards for Outstanding Cultural Program; it won five Gemini Awards in 1997. An album was released in 1997.
Live at El Morro, Puerto Rico is the fourth live album by Yanni, released on the Yanni/Wake label in 2012. The two concerts were performed outdoors on the grounds of El Morro castle in San Juan, Puerto Rico in December 2011.
Alen Hodzovic is a German actor and singer. In 2009, he became the first German citizen to win First Prize at Kurt Weill Foundation's international Lotte Lenya Competition for singers. He graduated from the Royal Academy of Music in London where he won the H.L. Hammond Prize for Verse Speaking, adjudicated by director John Caird. He played Raoul in the Stuttgart production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera and Ken in a German-language production of John Logan's play Red. In 2007, he appeared as a background singer for Elton John at the Concert for Diana at Wembley Stadium.
Lisa Lavie is a Canadian singer and songwriter originally from LaSalle, Quebec, Canada.
Ginger Costa-Jackson is an Italian-American operatic mezzo-soprano who performs often with the Metropolitan Opera since entering its Lindemann Young Artist Development Program in 2007. The Met: Live in HD global broadcasts feature her frequently, as do other major theaters and concert venues worldwide. Costa-Jackson has performed in her native Italian as well as English, French, and Spanish; she speaks these languages fluently, along with limited German. While her signature role is Carmen, Costa-Jackson also performs comic roles, as in her Marchesa di Poggio, and also her 2009 Celia in Gilbert and Sullivan's Iolanthe with the San Francisco Symphony.
Fernando Varela is a Puerto Rican operatic and classical crossover tenor, who has performed in staged operas, as a member of the classical crossover trio Forte Tenors, and as a solo artist. As a solo artist, he has toured internationally with David Foster, and also tours independently, having completed a European tour in 2016. In 2017, Varela debuted his PBS special "Fernando Varela: Coming Home", performed at the Grammy Museum Gala honoring David Foster, and joined Sarah Brightman on the Royal Christmas Gala tour November - December, 2017. From 2018 into 2020, Varela has toured extensively with David Foster, and has participated in several charitable events.
The Dream Concert: Live from the Great Pyramids of Egypt is the fifth live album and concert video by contemporary instrumentalist Yanni, officially released on June 3, 2016. The two concerts were performed outdoors on October 30 and 31, 2015, on the grounds of the Egyptian pyramids and Great Sphinx of Giza, Yanni's first performance in Egypt.
Gan-ya Ben-gur Akselrod is an American-Israeli operatic soprano who made an international career.
