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Chansons des quais in Staged Premiere

Jan. 30, 2025

An adventurous triple bill in November 2024 at London’s Royal College of Music included a pre-Christmas gift to audiences: the staged premiere of Chansons des quais (Songs of the Waterfront), a cycle of songs and instrumental numbers devised by Kim H. Kowalke and edited by John Baxindine. The cycle’s music is drawn entirely from Weill’s score for Marie galante (1934), which, though unsuccessful as a play, provided its composer with the opportunity to create a number of exquisite songs that are still performed frequently today. Included, for instance, are “J' attends un navire,” “Le train du ciel,” “Le Roi d'Aquitaine,” along with the “Tango-Habanera,” an instrumental selection that later acquired lyrics by Roger Fernay to become the famous “Youkali.” Chansons is available on a 2019 release featuring vocalist Ute Gfrerer and vocal quartet amarcord with Ensemble Modern, conducted by HK Gruber.

In the Royal College production, the cycle was paired in the first half with Britten’s Les illuminations; Ravel’s L’heure espagnole completed the program. The Britten and Weill were linked by a staging device whereby the female lead in each played older and younger incarnations of Jeanne Florentine Bourgeois, aka “Mistinguett,” the famed early twentieth-century French actress-singer who was said at one point to have been the highest paid female entertainer in the world. Reviewer Robert Hugill observed that “there are different ways of interpreting the Weill of this period; the music was written for singing actors but requires musical skill and it can be sung classically” and further noted that conductor Michael Rosewell and the orchestra “did Weill proud.”


Chansons Des Quais - Introduction/Ensemble Modern/HK Gruber


J'attends un navire/Teresa Stratas/From: Stratas Sings Weill


Youkali/Barbara Hannigan, soprano & Alexandre Tharaud, piano


Soprano Marie Oppert and pianist Charlotte Gauthier perform "le train du ciel"
from Kurt Weill's Marie Galante

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