Kurt Weill - In Search of Youkali (Katie Bray)

Information

Composer: Kurt Weill

1. A Glimpse of Youkali - An Improvisation
2. Barbarasong (from The Threepenny Opera)
3. Berlin im Licht
4. Overture to The Threepenny Opera
5. Surabaya Johnny (from Happy End)
6. A Vision of Youkali - An Improvisation
7. Complainte de la Seine ("Beauties of the Night" from the Torn Dress)
8. Je ne t’aime pas (from Marie Galante)
9. J’attends un navire (from Marie Galant)
10. A Dream of Youkali - An Improvisation
11. Buddy on the Nightshift (from Lunchtime Follies)
12. Nanna’s Lied
13. September Song (from Knickerbocker Holiday)
14. Apple Jack (from Huckleberry Finn)
15. A Premonition of Youkali - An Improvisation
16. Speak Low (from One Touch of Venus)
17. My Ship (from Lady in the Dark)
18. This Time Next Year (from Huckleberry Finn)
19. Youkali

Katie Bray, mezzo-soprano

Murray Grainger, accordion

Marianne Schofield, double bass

William Vann, piano

Date: 2026

Label: Chandos

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Review

Youkali, for Kurt Weill, was the land of desires, promised but never to be attained – a strong image for an exiled and itinerant composer. The 1935 song in which he captured the idea, a lilting tango, forms the lodestar of Katie Bray’s voyage through Weill’s chameleonic songwriting career, undertaken alongside the pianist William Vann, accordionist Murray Grainger and double bassist Marianne Schofield, the latter moonlighting from the Hermes Experiment.

First, we hear a haunting, unaccompanied musing on the Youkali melody, then more of these punctuate the programme until we reach the song in full at the end. The journey takes in numbers in German, French and English – some familiar, some not – including a couple of songs written for the Huckleberry Finn musical Weill was working on at the time of his death.

Bray and Vann have been developing this programme together for years, and it shows in their easy fluency; the other two instruments are used tellingly, painting in subtle rather than primary colours. As for Bray, she is outstanding. From the deliciously acerbic Barbarasong to the bleakly controlled emotion in Je ne t’aime pas, her singing is a demonstration of how an elevated, “trained” voice can sound wonderfully communicative and natural in this music.

— Erica Jeal

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Kurt Weill (March 2, 1900 – April 3, 1950) was a German-born American composer. He showed early musical talent and received formal training in Berlin, studying under teachers including Engelbert Humperdinck and Ferruccio Busoni. Weill rose to prominence in Germany through collaborations with playwrights like Georg Kaiser and especially Bertolt Brecht, with whom he created The Threepenny Opera (1928). However, as a Jewish composer, his career in Germany was cut short by the rise of the Nazi regime. Fleeing to the U.S. in 1935, Weill became a key figure on Broadway, collaborating with top American writers.

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Katie Bray is a British mezzo-soprano. A Karaviotis Scholar at the Royal Academy of Music, she won the Principal's Prize and First Prize in the Richard Lewis Singing Competition, and later received the Dame Joan Sutherland Audience Prize at Cardiff Singer of the World. She has performed leading operatic roles with major companies including English National Opera and Welsh National Opera. Bray is also an accomplished concert and recital artist, collaborating with prominent orchestras and ensembles. Particularly noted for her baroque repertoire, her a diverse performance portfolio spans opera, concert works and cabaret.

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