Kraków Opera: The Winter Journey

“I like these songs more than all the others and so will you” – wrote Franz Schubert to his friends of Winterreise, one of his last achievements. How disappointed he must have been when the cycle of songs he composed in 1827 to the verse of Wilhelm Müller met with a cold reception… The work’s gloomy mood in no way resembled the joyful and carefree pieces which Schubert had penned in his earlier years. The despair and suffering in Müller’s strophes corresponded with the state of the composer’s spirit at the time – he was depressed, had serious health problems and was not infrequently thinking about death, which did indeed take him in November of the following year. Unsurprisingly, nowhere else does his music sound as bleak as in Winterreise.

Despite this, this Romantic masterpiece has fascinated successive generations of listeners. In 1994, Stanisław Barańczak was inspired by it to write a cycle of verse that employed the title and form of Müller’s cycle, and also the textual structure, so that it might also be performed to the accompaniment of Schubert’s composition. Although it is rooted in modernity, similarly to Müller’s cycle it tells of an indefatigable loneliness. This vision of a hostile and inaccessible wintry kingdom, portrayed through Barańczak’s words and adapted and directed by Józef Opalski, is to be presented by Andrzej Biegun (baritone) and Konrad Mastyło (piano) and Olha Tsymbaluyk (piano) in the Kraków Opera’s production.

Cast:
Andrzej Biegun (baritone)
Konrad Mastyło (piano)
Olha Tsymbalyuk (piano)

Direction and adaptation: Józef Opalski
Set design and costumes: Marek Braun
Musical direction: Konrad Mastyło
Scene movement: Jacek Tomasik