Monday, January 9, 2012

Mein deutscher Lieblingssongstress

Over at The Dabbler the other day Malty gave us an eclectic musical tour of Germany . But he missed my own favourite German voice and so gave me a splendid excuse to post some myself.

In the 70's Dagmar Krause was singer first with Slapp Happy and then with my favourite prog rock band of all time Henry Cow.

But I want to concentrate on her other side as a wonderful interpreter of the songs of Bertolt Brecht, Kurt Weill and Hans Eisler. Forget the wholly over-rated Ute Lemper, Dagmar is the finest since Lotte Lenya herself. Lemper seems merely a singer. With Dagmar, its from the heart.


Brecht/Weill's  Surabaya Johnny

 Hans Eisler's Song of a German Mother. I was lucky enough to see her around this time in Manchester when she had the 'Tank Battles' album of Eisler songs released.

And finally, in the original german, but without video I'm afraid, Brecht and Eisler's Song Von Der Ware (Supply and Demand)

For any German readers I'm sorry about the post title. My German regarding anything but textile terms is pitiable (thats likely pretty awful too these days) and so I relied on BabelFish for my translation.

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