Der Jasager

PAN-ASIAN MUSIC FESTIVAL: Der Jasager by Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht

Bertold Brecht and Kurt Weill’s Der Jasager (The Yea-sayer) is an educational piece written in Germany in 1930 promoting individual sacrifice for the good of the whole community. The libretto is based on Taniko, a centuries-old Japanese Noh drama: A teacher leads an expedition to the mountains. With him is a boy whose mother is ill. The boy has insisted on going on the dangerous trek in order to obtain medicine for his mother. On the way, the boy himself falls ill and is asked whether he will agree to be sacrificed in accordance with custom. He answers yes and is hurled from the mountain by his fellow students. The Stanford Opera Workshop’s production of Der Jasager is set in an ant colony. By way of a prelude and postlude, recent Stanford graduates Marc Evans and Andrew Linford have set Haiku and Japanese folk texts which juxtapose the human and ant behaviors. This performance features Stanford Opera Workshop singers and chamber orchestra, Happy Dog Piano Duo, Stanford Taiko, Stanford Gu-Zheng, and the Chorus of the German International School of Silicon Valley, with the support of music director Marie-Louise Catsalis, stage director Nova Jiménez and dramaturg Melissa Kagen. | Presented by Stanford Opera Workshop in collaboration with the Pan-Asian Music Festival. Co-sponsored by the Department of Music, The Shenson Family Fund and SiCa. Funded in part by the Kurt Weill Foundation for Music, Inc., New York, NY.

free admission

• Venue: Dinkelspiel Auditorium, Stanford University
• Date: Sat February 4, 2012 2:00pm
• City: Palo Alto
• Email: mlcats@stanford.edu
• Price Range: Free
• Tickets: 650 776 0635

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