Ensemble Connect
Part of: Fall of the Weimar Republic: Dancing on the Precipice
Performers
Ensemble Connect
Program
SCHULHOFF Concertino for Flute, Viola, and Double Bass
WEILL String Quartet, Op. 8
BERG Lyric Suite
GERSHWIN Lullaby
Event Duration
The printed program will last approximately 90 minutes, including one 20-minute intermission.Salon Encores
Join us for a free drink at a post-concert reception in Weill Recital Hall’s Jacobs Room.
Learn More
Global Ambassadors: Michael ByungJu Kim and Kyung Ah Park, Hope and Robert F. Smith, and Maggie and Richard Tsai.
Additional support has been provided by the Kathi and Peter Arnow Foundation, Ronald E. Blaylock and Petra Pope, E.H.A. Foundation, Barbara G. Fleischman, Clive and Anya Gillinson, Stella and Robert Jones, Martha and Robert Lipp, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Susan and Elihu Rose Foundation, Melanie and Jean E. Salata, The Morris and Alma Schapiro Fund, Sarah Billinghurst Solomon and Howard Solomon, Carlos Tome and Theresa Kim, and David S. Winter.
This Concert in Context
George Gershwin started writing Lullaby around 1919 while he was a student studying with the Hungarian émigré composer and pedagogue Edward Kilenyi. The piece appeared at a time of profound hope mixed with uncertainty for the fledgling Weimar Republic. Germany’s loss in World War I had seen the collapse of the German Empire and abdication of the Kaiser followed by the founding of Germany’s first experiment with democracy. But the punishing terms imposed by the Treaty of Versailles and revolutionary agitation on both the far left and right contributed to economic dislocation and political violence that would plague the Republic for much of its roughly 14-year existence.
When Kurt Weill wrote his String Quartet in 1923, Germany was in the midst of disastrous hyperinflation that wiped out Germans’ savings and sparked political unrest, culminating in Hitler’s failed Beer Hall Putsch. However, when Berg’s Lyric Suite and Schulhoff’s Concertino were composed in 1925 and 1926, the Republic’s supporters saw reasons for hope as Germany enjoyed a period of much-needed support and stability. While the introduction of the Rentenmark in November 1923 stabilized the currency, the signing of the Locarno Treaties in October 1925 held the promise of restoring relations between Germany and its former enemies Great Britain and France. Unfortunately, such stability would not endure. The US stock market crash in 1929 imposed huge burdens on the German economy, and Hitler’s appointment as chancellor in January 1933 marked the beginning of the end for Weimar democracy.
—Brendan Fay, author of Classical Music in Weimar Germany