Germany's Ute Lemper is internationally renowned as a singer, songwriter, dancer, and actress. Her 1986 debut, Ute Lemper Sings Kurt Weill, established her as a primary interpreter of Weimar Germany's cabaret song tradition. 1989's Crimes of the Heart showcased her as a classically trained pop singer. In 1993, she issued the international best-seller Illusions with authoritative interpretations from the French chanson tradition. She collaborated with Stephen Sondheim on 1995's City of Strangers. 2000's Punishing Kiss offered songs written for her by modern songwriters including Elvis Costello and Scott Walker. She paid tribute to poet Pablo Neruda on 2015's Forever: The Love Poems of Pablo Neruda, and to novelist Paulo Coelho, who she collaborated with on 2016's The Nine Secrets. In 2020, Lemper honored Marlene Dietrich with Rendezvous with Marlene. 2023's all-original Time Traveler balanced decades' old privately recorded original songs with newly composed material.