“In a world without melancholy, nightingales would belch.” Dagmar Manzel cites this wonderful quote by Emile Cioran and smiles. “There’s this certain Jewish humour in the songs which suits me quite nicely. It opens my heart. I simply want to sing this music. I wouldn’t want to live without these songs.” Thankfully, she doesn’t have to. Manzel is one of today’s most versatile stage artists and is known for her theatre, opera and TV roles alike. We talked about our love of music and the texts of the Weimar time, her path from acting to singing and why it is still important today to uphold the legacy of the 1920s and 30s.
On the 23rd September the Berlin-born singer comes to London for a very special evening: Weimar Berlin: To the Cabaret! with the Philharmonia Orchestra. “I’m so looking forward to working with the Philharmonia Orchestra, especially with Esa-Pekka Salonen. I adore him and it’s a great joy to do a concert together!” Needless to say, she sings songs from the 20s and 30s, the 15 years between the two world wars which sparkle with creativity. The Philharmonia explores this era with a series of concerts, talks and cabaret: Weimar Berlin – Bittersweet Metropolis. It is fitting the that Dagmar Manzel has specialised in this field. From songs to operetta, Paul Abraham to Oscar Straus, she has devoted her career to this special time, mainly in Berlin.
When it comes to the selection of songs for such an evening, “it’s only coherent that all composers whose songs I sing are Jewish. All important composers of the 1920s and 30s are of Jewish origin.” Of course, the Berlin dialect has to be included. “It’s my home, those are my roots. I have a very close relationship with the music, especially because I sing at the very same house that used to be the Metropol Theater. All important artists of that time appeared on stage here, starting with Fritzi Massary. Straus and Abraham stood in the orchestra pit and conducted. We sing their music, we play their pieces. You can’t really say that we follow in their footsteps, but it is our duty to preserve this art and this music.”
“I encountered the music of Werner Richard Heymann and Abraham, Friedrich Hollaender and Hanns Eisler quite early on when I was still a young girl.” She was impressed by their incredibly powerful biographies and the contradictory and exciting times reflected in the texts. “I would have loved to be a fly on the wall back then,” she says joyfully. “But 1933 changed everything. Many artists left, emigrated and sadly many of them were killed. So much has been forgotten.” At the same time, cultural Berlin was flourishing. “The actors would play at the Deutsche Theater, then go to nightclubs and sing. During the night they would do some dubbing and the next morning, after three hours of sleep, get up again and shoot a film. [Manzel laughs] It’s a bit different today.”
“The UFA (Universum Film AG), the films they would make there! Heyman was the UFA composer. Not many remember his name today, but everyone knows his songs: Irgendwo auf der Welt (Somewhere in the world) or Das gibt’s nur einmal (It only exists once). The Nazis tried to hide this music, but not with me!”
Even though music didn’t play a big role in her family, Dagmar Manzel always wanted to become a singer. “In parallel to my acting, I’ve always been working on songs. I only ever sang to myself, but then had the fortune of meeting a friend, an opera singer, who said ‘Let’s do an evening together’” And that’s what they did. “It was called Eine Sehnsucht, egal wonach (A desire, no matter for what), named after Hollaender. At the time, I’d already been taking singing classes. I’m still working together with the same teacher for more than 20 years now.”