The Threepenny Opera

The Threepenny Opera proclaims itself an opera for beggars and it was in fact an attempt both to satirize traditional opera and operetta and to create a new kind of musical theater based on the theories of two young German artists composer Kurt Weill and poetplaywright Bert Brecht The show opens with a mockBaroque overture a nod to Threepennys source The Beggars Opera a brilliantly successful parody of Handels operas written by John Gay in 1728 In a brief prologue following the overture a shabby figure comes onstage with a barrel organ and launches into a song chronicling the crimes of the notorious bandit and womanizer Macheath Mack the Knife The setting is a fair in Soho London just before Queen Victorias coronation In this production Weill champion HK Gruber led the Ensemble Modern in a performance of Weills complete original score the first time it had been heard in Germany in many years This production was broadcast on German television 3sat