After discovering a rare Viktor Ullmann video, the Shoah Songbook concert and seeing Ute Lemper live I decided to go off and have a look for more music from Weimar, the Holocaust and resistance to Nazis; past and present.  It was an interesting haul and included a 2018 album from English cabaret singer/comedienne Melinda Hughes.

Her 2018 album Weimar and Back consists of the songs from her one woman show Margo Half Woman Half Beast about the cabaret singer Margo Lion.  It’s a mix of Weimar cabaret material by the likes of Mischa Spoliansky, Friedrich Hollaender, Kurt Weill and Werner Heymann that anyone familiar with the genre likely knows.  There’s Das lila Lied and Chuck All the Men out of the Reichstag and Youkali and  Der Mensch muss ein Heimat haben but there’s also more modern material; mostly by Hughes and collaborator Jeremy Limb. Continue reading →