Robin Hamilton wrote:
>< This was at the
>
>
>>Lenya/Lemper/Stratas level where you inhabit Weill's music.
>>
>>
>Depends on the time Lotte Lenya was singing -- the original thirties version
>is magic, but by the fifties, her throat seemed to have gone into total
>meltdown.
>
>
Apropos of nothing in particular, there's an odd connection between
Lenya and Teresa Stratas. The latter, apart from Hildegard Behrens, was
the most magnetic female opera singer I ever saw: a woman five-foot
nothing who may have weighed 100 pounds dripping wet who nevertheless
owned any stage she was on. Yet she went hugely underrecorded probably
because she was an unstable pain in the ass with a propensity to cancel
on short notice, have nervous breakdowns, and make suicide attempts,
usually over men. The two solo recordings she has are nonoperatic, of
Weill's music. The story *as I read it* (an opera listserv is a
notoriously unreliable place to get information) was that while Stratas
was performing as Jenny in *Mahagonny* in New York, Lenya was in the
audience. Afterward she went backstage and in front of all bystanders
pronounced Stratas her successor as a Weill interpreter. Several years
later, when Lenya was dying an agonizing death of lung cancer, Stratas
moved into the apartment and slept on the floor by Lenya's bed. Quite
mad, perhaps, but also hugely generous.
Odd, yes--afterwards I believe she claimed to be channeling Lenya. Oh
well. Last night, in any case, I dug out Stratas' recording of
"Surabaya Johnny" and simply marveled. The voice holds all the hurt and
anger there is. Not early Lenya but pretty amazing anyway.
ken
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Kenneth Wolman
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