The operas and other stage works of American composer Kurt Weill (1900-1950) had considerable influence on contemporary Western musical theater.

Kurt Weill was born in Dessau, Germany, on March 2, 1900. He studied piano as a child and composed several works before enrolling at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik at age 18. He left to work in provincial opera houses, returning to Berlin to study with Ferruccio Busoni from 1921 to 1924.

Weill's early compositions were largely instrumental concert works written in the current "advanced" style, but in 1926 he composed a one-act opera, Der Protagonist (The Protagonist; libretto by Georg Kaiser), and concentrated henceforth on stage works. Two short operas containing elements of popular music followed: Royal Palace (1926; by Kaiser) and Der Zar lässt sich photographieren (1927, The Czar Has His Photograph Taken; by Ivan Goll).

As a composer, Weill achieved maturity in his collaboration with the poet-playwright Bertolt Brecht...