Marc Blitzstein: Zipperfly & Other Songs is, along with the
James Sinclair-led Orchestral Music of Charles Ives, definitely one of the triumphs of the early American Koch catalog. Featuring the
New York Festival of Song, fresh from its triumph premiering
Leonard Bernstein's valedictory work Arias and Barcarolles,
NYFOS turned its attention to
Bernstein's own primary inspiration among his colleagues.
Bernstein did not live to see this disc released, but from it is easy to experience what in Blitzstein
Bernstein gained; a taste for sassy, swaggering bluesiness and an appreciation for populist melody that
Bernstein turned right around into his own work, utilizing, of course, his own style. Some listeners will find certain pieces here so close to the idiom of Broadway that one might wonder, "What makes them classical?" Blitzstein often interrupts his settings with laconic dissonances, and some of his phrase lengths do not correspond to usual practice, though certain songs do not depart much from the model, for example, "I Wish It So." His choice of subjects, likewise, tend to be cynical, street-smart, or fatalistic, in keeping with the politically dangerous example of Weimar theater and its personalities, Kurt Weill, Bertolt Brecht, and Hanns Eisler.
The historic range of song represented roughly covers a period from the early '30s to about 1960; Blitzstein's output in song drops off right after "Zipperfly" in 1945, so songs from later shows such as Juno are brought into the mix, plus some items excerpted from the late cycle From Marion's Book (1958) after texts of e.e. cummings. The soloists here are baritone
William Sharp -- who turns in a particularly fine performance -- soprano Karen Holvik, and pianist and
NYFOS co-founder Steven Blier, who performs on all tracks. Long unavailable after it dropped out of the catalog, Marc Blitzstein: Zipperfly & Other Songs was reissued in 2009 with a slightly different cover; the only complaint about the new package is that the notes are reproduced in tiny print on a diagonal pattern in the background, rendering them very difficult to read. In every other way, its return is a reason to celebrate for listeners devoted to the cause of American song.