Kurt Weill: And What Was Sent to the Soldier’s Wife?, song (1942)
Soeben erhielt ich Ihren zweiten Brief. Zunächst vielen Dank für den wunderschönen Song. Ich werde ihn komponieren, und wenn Sie wollen, werde ich ihn den Leuten anbieten, die die short-wave Sendungen nach Deutschland machen.
[I just received your second letter. First of all many thanks for the wonderful song. I will compose it and if you want I will offer it to the people who make short-wave programmes to Germany. (ed. trans.)]
Kurt Weill to Bertolt Brecht, 13 March 1942
The composer Kurt Weill, in exile in the US, set Bertolt Brecht’s poem And What Was Sent to the Soldier’s Wife? to music for singing voice and piano. The seven verses describe the things that a soldier sends to his wife from various stops. The choice of the locations Prague, Warsaw, Oslo, Rotterdam, Brussels, Paris and Tripoli make it clear that this concerns territories which were occupied by the German Wehrmacht. A soldier in the war sends his wife souvenirs: a pair of high-heeled shoes, a linen shirt, a fur collar, a hat, a silk dress. Weill composed a cheerful, vivacious melody for Brecht’s verses, in contrast to the serious subject matter, which makes it all the more bitter. At the end, in the eighth verse, the soldier’s wife receives a widow’s veil from Russia.
The actress and singer Lotte Lenya sang the song for the first time in April 1942 at a New York concert which was staged to encourage the purchase of war bonds. The poem was also set to music by Hanns Eisler.
Gallery
