September Songs: The Music of Kurt Weill

A career trajectory that includes collaboration with Bertolt Brecht, and takes in both the Hollywood screen and the Broadway stage makes Kurt Weill among the most fascinating 20th century composers, but this is a sketchy tribute. Serving chiefly as a showcase for sundry stars to deliver their own versions of Weill's tunes, it relegates the strictly biographical information to odd moments between the numbers. More frustrating is the lack of contextualising information around the performances, and the often wayward choice of artists (Lou Reed murders the normally swoonsome 'September Song'). Chief highlights are Elvis Costello and the Brodsky String Quartet with an impassioned 'Lost in the Stars' and PJ Harvey's superbly controlled 'Ballad of a Soldier's Wife'. A very mixed bag.