Karen Kohler brought her tribute to Kurt Weill to The Manor, New Jersey's cabaret outpost. The European-born singer offered selections of Weill's songs, both well-known and those not often heard. With Bertolt Brecht, Weill wrote The Three Penny Opera with its electrifying "Mack the Knife" (with which Kohler opened the show) while still in his twenties.

After fleeing Germany in the 'thirties, Weill remained in Paris for a while, writing songs with French lyrics. Finally settling in the United States, he collaborated during the short life remaining to him (he died at fifty) with such American lyricists as Ira Gershwin, Ogden Nash, and Maxwell Anderson. Kohler included Weill songs in German, French, and English, providing help to her audience by translating or paraphrasing the foreign lyrics that most were unlikely to understand. But she avoided a mechanical approach by prefacing each those numbers with a dramatic reading that revealed the intensity of emotion in Weill's songs.

Since Kohler first came to New York's cabaret scene several years ago, both her voice and her acting have strengthened, and while occasionally the intensity of her interpretive introductions seemed over the top, at other times the pairing of dramatic reading and singing was mesmerizing. Particularly compelling if ironically understated was the "Ballad of a Soldier's Wife," in which the wife describes the gifts she receives from her husband fighting in Czechoslavakia, Holland, Belgium, and France. Her final "gift," from Russia, is a widow's veil. One can be on any side of the present anti-war sentiment sweeping America's political scene and still recognize the pathos in the ballad.

A perennial favorite with Weill fans, "Surabaya Johnny," also speaks to contemporary concerns, expressing the feelings of a woman mistreated by her lover but clinging to her devotion to him. Kohler's rendition highlighted the emotional conflict and ranged over a myriad of responses, from anger to despair. Similarly ironic but also devastating was Je ne t'aime pas, where a woman denies she still loves her man but obviously does.

An active proponent of the European songbook, Kohler reveals, however, the effortless way Weill adopted with enthusiasm an American identity and contributed to the American songbook. This performance was one-time-only at The Manor. Fortunately, Kohler brings the songs of Weill to other shows at other venues. Watch for her.

Barbara Leavy
Cabaret Scenes
September 23, 2007
www.cabaretscenes.org