"Abstract: Winterreise
"Franz Schubert’s Winterreise (Winter Journey), a cycle of 24 songs for voice and piano, was written in the autumn of 1827, one year before Schubert’s death. The cycle, which consists of settings of poems by Wilhelm Müller, is not only considered the pinnacle of Schubert’s work as a songwriter, but also the very apotheosis of the German art song. In 24 snapshots, like a kaleidoscope, Schubert reveals the sentiments of a lost, wounded and lonely character. Few works of art have expressed the existential conflict of the human condition as devastatingly as this composition.

"The German composer Hans Zender arranged the cycle as Schuberts Winterreise – eine komponierte Interpretation (Schubert’s Winter Journey – a composed interpretation). Zender’s version for tenor and a small orchestra, which premièred in Frankfurt in 1993, is far more than simply an orchestral arrangement. At once sensitive and radical, it exposes the potentially distressing nature of the cycle, and adopts its own, new approach to the poems of Wilhelm Müller. Zender ventures into the darkest regions of the human condition. With his interpretation, he unearths emotions that pulse beneath the surface of Schubert’s music and exposes the sinister strata in the depths of the music.

"Similarly to Hans Zender, Christian Spuck’s production is concerned not so much with illustrating the various external stages of the traveller’s journey as with a far-reaching, abstract vision. In a mixture of large-scale ensemble scenes and numerous intimate solos, Christian Spuck embarks on a journey inside the human being. Exploring such timeless themes as love, longing, estrangement and abandonment, he uses the medium of dance to offer a new perspective on one of the great masterpieces of classical music..." [opernhaus]