An unusual way for a composer to get to know his future wife - she was sent to row him over a lake. There's no record of the colour of the lake, but there's one colour it was unlikely to be - but that came later. (A herald might dispute a part of that statement.) The wife, who married her passenger twice, is much better known by a name not her original one. Who was she, who did she become, and why did her husband's best known collaborator look better with his mouth shut (and why is this somewhat ironic)?

Datsmeharse

The woman was Karoline Wilhelmine Charlotte Blamauer. She took the stage name Lotte Lenya in 1914. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lotte_Lenya Rowing reference for meeting Kurt Weill: http://www.kwf.org/kwf/kurt-weill/for-further-reading/362-out-of-trouble?fontstyle=f-default Bertolt Brecht was her husband's best-known collaborator. I'm assuming the irony has something to do with Brecht's adaptation of the The Beggar's Opera, which he named The Threepenny Opera, and reworked the hero as Mack the Knife, with his pearly white teeth. I'm assuming Brecht did not have peraly white teeth, but cannot verify as dinner is ready! Oct 20 09, 4:17 PM

Baloo55th

Yay! Brecht had bad teeth (and apparently could have washed a bit more often too). Actually, it was the shark that had the pearly teeth, but never mind. Brecht's dramas are perhaps out of fashion, but Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder is fantastic. I remember seeing it in the round. Die Dreigroschenoper is also a great bit of work - as is John Gay's original.... Few can match Lotte Lenya's singing, but Ute Lemper doesn't do so badly. Oct 20 09, 5:16 PM