Sample Video

Petroleum Song (1928)

Sample Song Translation

The Ballad of Caesar’s Death (1933)

Ancient Rome was once a land of freedom
Where the blood ran hot through Roman veins
But when Caesar made himself supremo
All of Rome erupted into flames.

 Caesar would not listen to the warning:
“On the Ides of March you must beware”
But he clung more hungrily to power
And he ruled on high without a care. 

He was blind with bloodlust and ambition
In the Capitol his word was law
And the wise words of his old advisors
Saw them scorned and booted out the door. 

He derided more than he presided
And the Romans’ blood began to boil
When a Caesar tires of being decent
Then his friends will tire of being loyal. 

A cabal assembled in the night-time
Of the enemies he’d newly made
On the Ides of March they seized the moment:
Trusty Brutus stuck him with a blade.

Blow by blow they thrust him low and lower
And the tyrant took his final bow
“Et tu Brute!” Caesar cried in Latin
But his Latin couldn’t save him now. 

So beware the popular delusion
That the strong are worthier of life:
Caesar governed with a sworn of iron
But was slaughtered by a butcher’s knife.

Kurt Weill / Georg Kaiser (1933)
tr. George Robarts (2026)

“Judges described Robarts’s first-place performance with enthusiastic phrases such as ‘phenomenal actor,’ ‘every moment spontaneous,’ and ‘impeccable delivery of lyrics.’ Especially taken with his performance of Kurt Weill’s Muschel von Margate (Petroleum Song), they awarded it a rare near-perfect score.”

Kurt Weill Foundation, New York, May 2025

2025: First Prize in the Lotte Lenya Competition for singing actors across opera and musical theatre
Awarded by the Kurt Weill Foundation

2024: First Prize in the John Dryden Translation Prize, for a new translation of a comic opera libretto
Awarded by the British Comparative Literature Association

georgerobarts.com/about

You are a king, and your stocks are your slaves,
You make a mint while others walk the plank.
Don’t think of them – think of the cost it saves,
And you’ll be laughing all the way to the bank.

Lottery Agent’s Tango (Weill/Kaiser 1933, tr. GR)

A soldier willing to go out killing
From Belfast to Berlin
Will wade through mud for you
And spill the blood for you
Of foreign-looking races
In foreign-looking places
And serve them up like butchers’ meat
With gristle and skin

Cannon Song (Weill/Brecht 1928, tr. GR)

Sample Set List

It’s all a swindle (Spoliansky)
Supply and Demand (Eisler)
Lottery Agent’s Tango (Weill)
The Invigorating Impact of Cash (Eisler)
The Smart Set (Spoliansky)
Tug Your Belt In Tight (Weill)
Petroleum Song (Weill)
Cattle to the Slaughter (Eisler)
Cannon Song (Weill)
The Wise Woman and the Soldier (Eisler)
The Ballad of Caesar’s Death (Weill)