It is, in part, a personal matter. When I listen to music described as German cabaret music, I feel very uncomfortable, and at times I have to force myself to continue listening to it. Yet, to many people such music is a great deal of fun. In fact, it is very fashionable in certain circles as being "with it". Many, who like this music, are those who enjoyed the musical Cabaret with Liza Minnelli and Joel Grey. It never occurred to them that Cabaret is a play that satirizes the slow disintegration of a society into one of the most deplorable, not only in the 20^th Century, but any century.

So, what does one say when one of our most well known mezzo soprano's sings what might be called 'cross-over' music on her latest CD. Jean Stilwell, reviewed so many times in these pages has perhaps fallen in love with popular German music of the early 1900s and onward because she has performed in such operettas as Die Fledermaus, and she has mastered the art of Lieder singing.

She sings beautifully on this latest CD with its impeccable credentials. The performances are well shaped, and the CD's quality is very good. Yet, to be true to the medium of German cabaret music, Stilwell needs to be a contralto, preferably one with a smoky, husky voice. Her voice is just too clear and a little too high to give the songs the decadence they require.

Stilwell sings 18 songs, some of which have high-sounding cultural validity because they are composed by Arnold Schönberg, Kurt Weil and even Robert Schumann. But, for me this CD is a sampler of the sentimental German songs one can best describe as schmaltzy. Many of the lyrics either denigrate women or elevate them to unimaginable heights. It was very German of their time and still is to this day. Even today, Germans like their popular music sung by females who sound either like little girls, or like Marlene Dietrich, or Zarah Leander, who was known in her native Sweden as the Nazisiren. The latter two's voices are not only smoky and husky, but almost androgynous. Stilwell's voice is too womanly for this kind of music.

The perfect example of the woman on the pedestal is the poem by the great German poet, Heinrich Heine, 'Du bist wie eine Blume' (You are like a flower); it served as text for Schumann's song, which is from a very different period. The score fits neither among the CD's selections nor its theme, but its lyrics do.

Some of the melodies are quite pretty, even outstanding. Perhaps, because the very first song really hits me very negatively, it colors all of the rest. It is called 'Ganz Leise' (Very Quietly), a song that was very popular from the moment Zarah Leander first sang it in 1939. Its composer, Franz Grothe, made a comfortable living in Germany during the Hitler years, and wrote music for films even after the war. The deep-voiced Leander, this popular Swedish songstress, became one of the highest paid singers/actresses of Nazi Germany. Leander always claimed she only stayed in Germany to make money. She did, to her credit, leave in 1943 because she did not want to take German citizenship as had been requested of her. Still, she continued to dominated German popular radio to the end of the war. 'Illusion', Grothe's other tune on this CD from the 1941 German film of the same name, is played very well by pianist Kortgaard. Anyone who grew up in Germany during the war will be familiar with it.

The CD also contains songs that were composed for Hollywood in the German cabaret style. There is a silly piece called 'Give me the Man', which was written by Karl Hajos for the movie Morocco. It launched Marlene Dietrich in Hollywood. It is an example of the denigrating lyrics. It implies in its jaunty manner that women like to be forcefully subjected to the demands of men. Obviously, a man's dream, not a woman's. In its time it was considered very naughty, but today these lyrics are merely offensive.

On the other hand, the two songs featured by Kurt Weil, 'Lost in the Stars' and 'Saga of Jenny' are not really cabaret style songs. Written for the American stage, with lyrics by Ira Gershwin and Maxwell Anderson, their tone is very different.

Schönberg's songs were specifically written for an early type of German cabaret called Brettl-Lieder ( stage board songs), which are pre-World War One. Their lyrics appealed to the prurient mentality of the Wilheminian era. For the song, 'Galathea', he used lyrics by Frank Wedekind, whom we know best through Alban Berg's opera Lulu. Wedekind was known for his risque writings, which included song lyrics. He advocated the carnal lifestyle, and did so with considerable crassness. When listening to Galathea, one wonders which Galathea he is speaking of, the Greek nymph, daughter of the old man of the sea, Nereus, or the Roman version, a statue of a woman brought to life by Venus in response to prayers by the sculptor Pygmalion. One suspects it is the first. Hence, today the lyrics could be considered as being literary pedophilia. It is interesting to note that Wedekind was imprisoned for insulting the German Crown, but never for writing smutty material.

The second Schönberg song is not directly offensive. It tells girls, however, that if they aren't a bit naughty and don't use the bloom of their youth to attract a man, they will become an 'old spinster.' Not really the kind of message we want to give our young women today.

The question is, should a generation that has no connection to the negative German past be denied music that, for the most, is very charming - and here the emphasis is on music, not the lyrics? Of course not. But, it does not hurt to warn that the lyrics often go beyond what is acceptable today—although some of rap's lyrics are even more hateful—and that some of the songs have a connection to an odious past.

[Kabarett, with mezzo soprapno Jean Stilwell, CBC Records, MVCD 1162, 66:37 minutes]

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