Synopses & Reviews
and#147;This book, the first scholarly consideration of Weilland#8217;s complete output of stage works, is without doubt the most important critical study of the composerand#8217;s oeuvre to date in any language. Hintonand#8217;s scholarship is superior and his insights original and illuminating. The product of several decades of engagement with Weilland#8217;s works, their sources and reception, as well as the secondary literature, the book is a stunning achievement. Brilliantly conceived and executed, it will take its place as one of the cornerstones of Weill studies.and#8221;and#151;Kim H. Kowalke, University of Rochester and President, Kurt Weill Foundation for Music
and#147;In Weilland#8217;s Musical Theater: Stages of Reform, Stephen Hinton reminds us that Kurt Weill was always a revolutionary. The composerand#8217;s insistent dedication to a provocative, constantly evolving lyric theater that spoke directly to audiences meant that Weill remained as controversial as he was popular. The celebrity that endeared him to Broadway made him anathema in Berlin. Some sixty years after Weilland#8217;s death, Hinton is finally able to demonstrate the consistent brilliance, theatrical power, and coherence of a composer who revolutionized every genre he touched (or used) and whose collaborators read as a whoand#8217;s who of twentieth-century theater.and#8221;
and#151;David Savran, author of Highbrow/Lowdown: Theater, Jazz, and the Making of the New Middle Class
"Stephen Hinton presents us with an image of Weill that is at once monumental yet still alive. A truly Protean figure, Weill is not an easy man to grasp in his totality; Brecht once wrote that a man thrown into water will have to develop webbed feet, and as a refugee from Nazi Germany, Weill had to become a cultural amphibian. But in Weill's Musical Theater we see the composer from every angle: through the gaze of countless critics and reviewers, through Weill's own eyes, and finally through the filter of Hinton's judicious, focused prose. This account will stand."and#151;Daniel Albright, author of Untwisting the Serpent: Modernism in Music, Literature, and Other Arts
Review
and#8220;Eminently readable, with or without his music playing in the background. Professor Hinton is a fine writer who conveys what he knows and feels in terms insightful, intuitive and nuanced, yet accessible to those of us who are musically marginalized.and#8221;
Review
and#8220;An in-depth view of the entire oeuvre of Weill's stage compositions. . . . A scholarly and thoroughly researched work. . . . Highly Recommended.and#8221;
Review
"This is essential reading not only for Weill scholars but also those interested in twentieth-century opera and the history of the American musical. . . . Its achievement will not soon be surpassed."
Synopsis
In the first musicological study of Kurt Weilland#8217;s complete stage works, Stephen Hinton charts the full range of theatrical achievements by one of twentieth-century musical theaterand#8217;s key figures. Hinton shows how Weilland#8217;s experiments with a range of genresand#151;from one-act operas and plays with music to Broadway musicals and film-operaand#151;became an indispensable part of the reforms he promoted during his brief but intense career. Confronting the divisive notion of and#147;two Weillsand#8221;and#151;one European, the other Americanand#151;Hinton adopts a broad and inclusive perspective, establishing criteria that allow aspects of continuity to emerge, particularly in matters of dramaturgy. Tracing his extraordinary journey as a composer, the book shows how Weilland#8217;s artistic ambitions led to his working with a remarkably heterogeneous collection of authors, such as Georg Kaiser, Bertolt Brecht, Moss Hart, Alan Jay Lerner, and Maxwell Anderson.
About the Author
Stephen Hinton is Avalon Foundation Professor in the Humanities at Stanford University. His publications include
Kurt Weill: The Threepenny Opera.Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
Preface and Acknowledgments
1. Biographical Notes
2. The Busoni Connection
3. One-Act Operas
4. and#147;Songspieland#8221;
5. Plays with Music
6. Epic Opera
7. Didactic Theater (and#147;Lehrstand#252;ckand#8221;)
8. Stages of Exile
9. Musical Plays
10. Stage vs. Screen
11. American Opera
12. Concept and Commitment
Coda
Appendix: Weilland#8217;s Works for Stage or Screen
Abbreviations
Notes
Credits
Index