★★★★☆ Digging the dirt on Kurt with Bert (and others).

Robyn Archer
Space Theatre, Adelaide
June 11-12, 2016

The Weill File
Dunstan Playhouse, Adelaide
June 13, 2016

The return of Brecht specialist, Adelaide’s own Robyn Archer is always welcome at the Cabaret Festival, bringing her authoritative talent to bear on that short period of artistic freedom in Germany which flourished for merely a decade or so between the Wars. In fact this incredibly creative and experimental period would be over by 1934 when the Nazis’ persecution of Jews, homosexuals and their sympathisers began truly in earnest. Focussing on songs by the likes of Brecht collaborators Weill and Eisler, Hollaender and others, and with the unique resources and knowledge of pianist and period specialist Michael Morley, Archer presented a wide range of material in her familiar contralto so appropriate for this material. This ranged from the familiar (Bert and Kurt’s Mack the Knife and the faded glories and memories of ol’ Bilbao to Friedrich Hollaender’s immortal Falling in Love Again), thorugh her own ‘hits’ with Hanns Eisler’s oh so political songs to less familiar fare concerning the precariousness of the period.

All selections were delivered in stylish German or (more often) in Morley’s own highly succinct, appropriate translations often reminding the audience that things remain the same – our troubles, be they personal or political – hence the continuing relevance of this material. Morley’s highly effective translations were, as always, delivered by Archer in the Australian vernacular of the period – resulting in a sort of CJ Dennis meets Brecht. Here was an altogether appropriate celebration of Archer’s art at its best. It was an entirely appropriate celebration of the year’s Festival’s Icon award.

Archer also proved to be an appropriate compère for The Weill File which followed his career from Berlin to Broadway with a sympathetic pit band led variously by Morley and John Thorn. The fine George Butrumlis as always provided much individual tone colour to both of these shows. Archer presented a fine array of this year’s artists presenting generally fine performances of Weill. Given Morley’s excellence, a judicious array of Weill’s material was presented satisfying the beginner as much as the aficionado. Although Weill died prematurely at 50, he would write to accompany three languages and change the style of the musical with psychoanalysis (Lady in the Dark), race relations in Lost in the Stars and his opera Street Scene certainly paved the way for the realism of Bernstein’s West Side Story a couple of decades later.

Highlights included Ali Mcgregor’s Je ne t’aime pas from his brief period of exile in Paris. Never before had I heard her put her operatic training to such effective use. Fellow Artistic Dirctor Eddie Perfect impressed with the power of his take on What Keeps Mankind Alive? whilst after warming up, local clown Hew Parham brought humour to the show with Das Chicago Song (originally written in the sixties as a Kurt parody for Madeleine Kahn. Archer appealed with the clarity and precision of her German delivery but perhaps finest of all was Barb Jungr’s visceral takes on Surabaya Johnny and the familiar Alabama Song. A few rarities to be savoured were included by Morley including the opening instrumental Langsamer Fox in what was probably its Australian premiere, and while the Roten Punkte’s take on the highly ironic Ballad of the Soldier’s Wife lacked in subtlety. Me, I’ll stick with Marianne Faithfull and Chris Spedding and their loping burlesque take recorded back in the eighties.