An oral history interview with Maurice Abravanel / conducted for the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music by David Farneth and Lys Symonette, Tanglewood, 1984 August 7 : recording and transcript.

ArchivalResource

An oral history interview with Maurice Abravanel / conducted for the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music by David Farneth and Lys Symonette, Tanglewood, 1984 August 7 : recording and transcript.

In a wide-ranging discussion, Abravanel takes up Weill's compositional ideas and methods; his opinions of other composers, especially Darius Milhaud and Igor Stravinsky; and his relations with various collaborators. He spends time on Weill's personal life, especially in Europe in the 1920's and early 1930's, and his relationship with Lotte Lenya. Additionally, Abravanel discusses Teresa Stratas's abilities as a Weill interpreter, and reminisces about several of Weill's stage works, notably One touch of Venus, Die sieben Todsünden, The firebrand of Florence, The eternal road, and Knickerbocker holiday. A good part of the interview is devoted to identifying names unearthed from Weill and Lenya's correspondence and papers.

1 transcript (58 p.) ; 28 cm.2 sound cassettes (ca. 180 min.) : analog, 1 5/16 ips., stereo.

Related Entities

There are 6 Entities related to this resource.

Farneth, David

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6h99737 (person)

Weill, Kurt

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6rr1x51 (person)

As a result of the success of his Broadway musical Lady in the dark in 1941, German-born composer Kurt Weill and his wife, the singing actress Lotte Lenya, were able to buy "Brook House," in Rockland County, New York, moving there during their sixth year in the United States. From Brook House, and a couple of addresses in Los Angeles during his trips there, Weill kept in touch, until a month before his death, with his parents, who had emigrated to Israel in 1935. From the description...

Lenya, Lotte

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w68g8mvt (person)

Born in Austria, Lenya became an actress in Zürich, then moved to Berlin where she met and married Kurt Weill. They emigrated to the U.S. in 1935, where Lenya lived until her death a few months after this interview was recorded. From the description of An oral history interview with Lotte Lenya / conducted for the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music by Alan Rich, New City, N.Y., 1981 : recording and transcript. (Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison). WorldCat record id: 12258368...

Abravanel, Maurice, 1903-1993.

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6gm887v (person)

Conductor of the Utah Symphony. From the description of Interviews, 1981. (Utah Historical Society). WorldCat record id: 122415000 Conductor. Abravanel (1903-1993) was born in Greece and grew up in Switzerland. He became a music theory student of Kurt Weill in 1922 in Berlin, and studied with him for a year. He and Weill remained good friends. When Abravanel became a conductor, Weill preferred him as a conductor of his own works; Abravanel conducted the premiere of Die siebe...

Symonette, Lys

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w67m096m (person)

Stratas, Teresa

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w68d0m8g (person)