Bucharest, Berlin, New York: The life of Sanda Weigl is a mirror of recent European history...
In her native Rumania, she was a child star singing gipsy songs on national TV. A relative of Helene Weigel, Brecht's widow, she fled to Eastern Berlin with her parents in 1961. As a member of the rock band Team 4 she made it to the GDR charts. When she protested against USSR's invasion of Prague, she was banned from performing in public and later deported to Western Berlin. There she started a career in theatre which led her to work with Luc Bondy, Jürgen Flimm, Peter Zadek and Robert Wilson. Meanwhile Weigl lives in New York and got back to the music that characterized her youth and kept her alive in GDR prison: the passionate songs of the Roma and Sinti Gypsies that came over in the interpretation of the gifted Romanian singer Maria Tanase.
To call Weigl's voice "powerful" would be an understatement. She has an impressive vocal range. Her range, timbre and declamatory style makes for an intriguing presentation of passion and even sexuality that is a synthesis of male and female. Her interpretations are dramatic, even theatrical, but never "over the top"... but Weigl's purpose is not to shock, but rather to communicate the vibrant life force inherent in the music. Which she does admirably, with an energy and panache that speaks of her intimate familiarity with the material. Always though, it comes back to Weigl's extraordinary voice. And if you're a fan of vocal ethnic music of any sort, that's something you don't want to miss. (Bill Tilland, BBC)
Sanda dusts off the travel-stained repertoire (of the Gypsy music) with cabaret stylings and art-songs arrangements...she has a healthy sense of absurdism, the kind of Balkan black humor you find in Kusturica's Yugoslavian Gypsy films ...(Time Out NY)
Weigl's voice reminds of Marlene Dietrich - sometimes diseuse, cabaret, then singer and actress - you can't nail her down she's full of melancholia, smoky and dark. It is never cliché - it is always very personnel. (Michael Stenger)