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Dear Colleagues I have been contacted by Birgitte Brunn (see below) about a brecht show. I do recall the Dublin concert which was very good. I now she is contacting the Goethe Institutes and i have warned her about the funding situation in the UK, but it might be that this chimes with colleagues. Replies direct to her please. best Karen Professor K.J. Leeder, Professor of Modern German Literature, Director of Graduate Studies in Modern Languages, Fellow and Tutor in German, New College, Oxford Symposium: Re-reading East Germany - 25-25 March 2011 http://www.mod-langs.ox.ac.uk/gdrculture ________________________________________ From: Birgitte Bruun [[log in to unmask]] Sent: 01 February 2011 21:00 To: Karen Leeder Subject: Brecht ? Dear Karen Leeder, I am a Danish actress-singer living in Copenhagen ,Denmark. In the 70's at theatre school, we worked with Gisela May - and that just did it for me, I fell in love with Brecht and the songs and have been singing them ever since. The 30 years of collaboration with Gisela May turned into a deep, longlasting friendship - and I was even asked to join her on stage at Berliner Ensemble for her 80th birthday gala performance a couple of years ago! I've sung Brecht and worked in Germany, played in Augsburg for the Festival twice, and done Brecht concerts not only throughout Denmark, but in Sweden, in Hong Kong (invited by Antony Tatlow), in Dublin (also asked to come over and sing by Antony Tatlow -, etc.. I can sing Brecht in German, English or Danish - with no accent. I'm Danish, so that's no problem, I grew up in the U.S., and later studied homoeopathy in Bath, U.K. ,- so fluent English is no problem,- and I've acted and toured in Germany (East and West, also living in Berlin for a number of years.- so I speak fluent German. A year ago, collaborating with a wonderful pianist from The Royal Danish Opera, Leif Greibe, I did a new Brecht cabaret called "Take that Pipe out of your Mouth, you Dog!" - which follows Brecht from cradle to tomb, following him from Augsburg to Berlin , through the 13 years as a refugee/emigrant - and back to Europe. Between songs I talk about his life, - and sing his songs - with music by Weill, Eisler and Dessau. For our newest programme, we have received the following reviews: "Brecht with Greatness" "Birgitte Bruun is a brilliant Brecht interpreter - in Danish and in German" Cabaret "Take that Pipe out of your Mouth, you dog!" Be gone, grand costumes, fancy lighting and digital magic. A microphone on a stand, a piano and a feather boa create the perfect illusion. When Birgitte Bruun in words and music guides the audience through the life and art of Bertolt Brecht, there is not a trace of museum in the performance. At the same time, Birgitte Bruun is able to let the novice into Brecht's universe, and, to give Brecht fans new facets of the man's extremely complicated personality. Whether Bruun is recapitulating the plot of "The Threepenny Opera", re-enacting "The Caucasian Chalk Circle", or describing the painful years in Brecht's life as the seducer and persecuted author, her stories grip our hearts. Hypnotic Basically, Brecht wrote the same songs again and again all through his life: the politically indignant songs, the naive love songs, and the lullabyes. Birgitte Bruun presents the stories so that songs depicting humble folk, prostitutes and thieves are lifted beyond political propaganda, and become a manifesto to all of us - who ought to go out and change the world, instead of sinking down into apathy. Birgitte Bruun spekas the most beautiful Danish, she never sounds old-fashioned, yet it is an almost even greater pleasure to hear her language when she choses to interpret three of the songs in perfect German. When she sings in German, we are confronted with the hypnotic power that lies in Brecht's lyrics. Formidable On top of that, Birgitte Bruun gives us innumerable variations and nuances in the songs, her seductive smiles, flirtatious turns of the head, and profound desperation become extra music on the stage. The pianist Leif Greibe (from The Royal Opera in copenhagen) is a formidable, awe-inspiring accompanist, who never places a single finger on the wrong key, he interprets the extremely difficult tunes with the cutting, strange harmonies, so that they seem like an organic prolongation of the lyrics. "Pirate Jenny", "Surabay-Johnny", "Bilbao song", "Barbara Song", and "Lullabyes for Working Mothers" are just some of the highlights of the evening. In short, "Take that Pipe out of your Mouth, you Dog!" is an artistic tour de force, so strong that it ought to get a visionary theatre producer /director to hire her immediately, so that she can play "Mother Courage". She has what it takes. Lene Kryger [log in to unmask] My question was: do you happen to know of any places /theatres universities, etc- in the U.K. to whom I might write and ask if they would be interested in a concert/performance ( mostly in English- with a handful of the songs sung in German )? With our new programme / cabaret - and the new reviews and the very strong reactions to it - I would love to take this outside of Denmark - and with 30 years of experience with Brecht plus the background from Masterclasses with Gisela May - plus the fantastic pianist, I really think we have something to offer. I used to perform in Germany quite often,- until the mid 1990's - where I did a monologue about Ruth Berlau which was a tremendous success on tour in Germany- but then I got a threatening letter from Barbara Brecht-Schall stating that if I ever played anything about Ruth Berlau again, I would never be allowed to sing Brecht again! I had had a sort of break-through with the monologue - in Germany ( it premiered in Augsburg, at the Brecht Festival)- but I never dared do anything in Germany any more,- and even lost 15,000 Pounds because after Barbara Brecht's letter, it wasn't possible to do the planned tour. One day I will do the play again, the whole story about Ruth Berlau is so interesting. And we never did anything disloyal to Brecht in the Ruth Berlau play, - so Barbara Brecht-Schall's rage was not reasonable. Anyway - this new cabaret we have produced really tells the story of the many exhausting years fleeing from one country to the next, how hard it was -and between spoken texts, the wonderful songs are done - and you feel instantly how great a poet Brecht is..We love doing it! In this context, I actually feel tremendous tenderness for Brecht. How on earth did he survive the pressure of the circumstances? (Well, in a way, he didn't- dying at that young age.) My thought is that our programme could be presented, not only to a normal audience, but also so students of German, of Music, of Litterature- and History. Would you have any advice? Where in the U.K. might someone want us? Any ideas? Best wishes- Birgitte