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Ute Lemper

Drama QueenDrama QueenRaconteur
Just saw Ute's cabaret act at Cafe Carlyle tonight. Singing Yiddish and French and German and Broadway songs, with a decided emphasis on Kurt Weill. The Bowie-esque quality of her readings of her own songs I expected. The debt to Lotte Lenya for the german songs totally expected (she is, after all the greatest Weill interpreter of her generation, Lenya's heir in a very real way). Unexpected: a goofy Jane Horrocks-like quality in her more comic moments. This woman would make so much more sense at Magique than Carlyle. Granted I love to see the bourgoisie so epatered, but she needs to bring her deliciously calculated chaos (incoheres anyone?) downtown.

And Why Not,
Addison DeWitt
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hatcheshatchesSage
I will admit to having recently become a huge fan of Ms. Lemper's. Her rendition of the brilliant tanquero Astor Piazolla's La Ballada de Mi Muerto (The Song Of My Death) never fails to raise the hairs on the back of my neck.
And, as I recall, her classic Weimar Republic I'm A Vamp could be heard frequently at Cabaret Magique last winter.
I think she is one of the few performers I would like to see live... for some reason I never have.
A andreabicsottiSage
Right now I'm OBSESSED with her. I still want the Punishing Kiss album. The 21st century Lenya, no, or yes? Or maybe Dietrich (sacrilige!) And I will say that her Velma in Chicago is great, check out the London Cast album. And she points out that Weill was an inspiration on the works of Kander and Ebb, of course Cabaret (obviously) but also Chicago, but I always thought Chicago was a tribute to vaudeville (well, in Fosse's original anyway!)--but I'm rambling. I love the Berlin Cabaret songs, but I have them in German, which is fine, I just pretend I'm in Weimar Berlin! The songs are hardly passe. Fabulous performer too.
A andreabicsottiSage
Hatches, I love the The Song of my Death. I figure that Buenos Aires would not be a bad place to die! What about the versionds of Brel: Ne Me Quitte Pas and Amsterdam. I like her version of the later but NMQP is great too, but I will always love Nina's version of that one (sorry Ute!). And I dance like mad to Marie Sanders. Still haven't gotten Punishing Kiss, and would like to get the Prevert stuff and the English versions of the Berlin Cabaret songs.
A andreabicsottiSage
Love the Scott Walker cover as well, and the Tango-Ballad, too, freaky and somehow you get a little sppoked out by how disjointed it seems (by both tracks I may add). And I love The Case Continues as well. I found the video on YouTube--type "Ute Lemper" in you'll find it. Beautiful I also think she dances in the video (well, she did do Cabaret and Chicago, for christsakes!). Also got the English versions of the Cabert Songs (the German ones) They are great, but I love the German-language version, I feel as if I'm in a caberet in Weimar Berlin.

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