' (literally ''The Yes Sayer''; also translated as ''The Affirmer'' or ''He Said Yes'') is an

opera Opera is a form of History of theatre#European theatre, Western theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by Singing, singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically ...

(specifically a '' Schuloper'' or "school-opera") by Kurt Weill to a German

libretto A libretto (From the Italian word , ) is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or Musical theatre, musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to th ...

Bertolt Brecht Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known as Bertolt Brecht and Bert Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a p ...

(after Elisabeth Hauptmann's translation from

Arthur Waley Arthur David Waley (born Arthur David Schloss, 19 August 188927 June 1966) was an English orientalist and sinologist who achieved both popular and scholarly acclaim for his translations of Chinese and Japanese poetry. Among his honours were ...

's English version of the Japanese Nō drama ''Taniko''). Its companion piece is '' Der Neinsager'' (''He Said No'') although Brecht's other text was never set by Weill. Weill also identifies the piece, following Brecht's development of the experimental form, as a '' Lehrstück'', or "teaching-piece".Weill says: "In '' Lindbergh's Flight'' Bert Brecht and I had the schools in mind for the first time. I am hoping to develop this direction further in my latest play, the '' Lehrstück'' ''He Said Yes''. ..I no longer want to offer 'songs' so much as self-contained musical forms. In the process I want to take over whatever I hitherto found right, like what I once termed the gestic approach to music. The melody must give clear expression to the gest. It is clarity, not lack of clarity that has to prevail in all that the composer wishes to express. And ..this ''Lehrstück'' has to be a fully authentic work of art, not a secondary piece." (Weill 1930, p. 334)

Performance history

It was first performed in Berlin by students of the Akademie für Kirchen- und Schulmusik at the Zentralinstitut für Erziehung und Unterricht on 23 June 1930 and broadcast simultaneously on radio. It was successful and there were over 300 performances during the following three years. Brecht subsequently revised the text twice, the final version, including ''Der Neinsager'', being without music.

Plot

A teacher leads a hike in the mountains, among the hikers being a young boy whose mother is quite ill. One variant of the story holds that the expedition is a quest for medicine, while another holds that it is in fact a religious pilgrimage. During the expedition the boy falls ill as well. He is asked whether he should be abandoned by his fellow hikers, for which the customary and expected response is yes. In ''Der Neinsager'', the boy answers no and suggests instead that a different custom should be introduced, "'the custom that one must think afresh in every new situation"'.

Roles

References

Sources

* * Hinton, Stephen. 1992. "''Jasager, Der''". In ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Opera ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'' is an encyclopedia of opera. It is the largest work on opera in English, and in its printed form, amounts to 5,448 pages in four volumes. The dictionary was first published in 1992 by Macmillan Reference, L ...

''. Ed.

Stanley Sadie Stanley John Sadie (; 30 October 1930 – 21 March 2005) was a British musicologist, music critic, and editor. He was editor of the sixth edition of the '' Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' (1980), which was published as the first edition ...

. London:. . * Weill, Kurt. 1930. Interview. In ''Collected Plays: Three'' by Bertolt Brecht. Ed. and trans. John Willett. Brecht Collected Plays Ser. London: Methuen, 1997. . pp. 334–335

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Jasager, Der Operas by Kurt Weill Plays by Bertolt Brecht Lehrstücke by Bertolt Brecht German-language operas Operas 1930 operas Operas based on plays