Schubert Winterreise

World famous mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato and conductor-pianist Yannick Nézet-Séguin join forces to take on one of the most brilliant song cycles ever written: Schubert’s Winterreise (Winter Journey). DiDonato, however, casts a different light on this beloved cycle of 24 songs in telling their story from the perspective of the woman, the lost love. Nancy Plum, Town Topics writes: “The question of what happened to the woman who sent the narrator on a tortuous journey was not answered in the Wilhelm Müller poetry from which Schubert drew the text, but DiDonato created a scenario onstage of being that woman, reading from the narrator’s journal and responding to the inherent despair.” “What stood out was the heavy emotion that came through in her singing, as she lingered on a syllable here, pressed her tone there. She created vivid feelings with her contrasts” wrote New York Classical Review about Joyce Didonato’s interpretation.

This DVD showcases Quasthoff’s soulful interpretation of Schubert’s Die Winterreise, filmed earlier this year in Berlin with Daniel Barenboim on the piano.
It captures not only Quasthoff’s exceptional musicality but also the emotional gravity of his performance, which led Der Tagesspiegel to extol Quasthoff’s astonishing ability "not so much recall events as relive them all over again, summoning them back to life."
In addition to the full concert, the DVD includes rich bonus footage from the rehearsal and interviews with Thomas Quasthoff and Daniel Barenboim – allowing a close look on how these two musical masterminds work out their vision of Schubert’s touching masterpiece.

On their new GENUIN CD, baritone Florian Götz and the musicians of the Grundmann-Quartett dare to present well-known works in new contexts: they perform Franz Schubert's moving „Winterreise” in a version in which the vocal part is accompanied by English horn and string trio. Exciting chromatic worlds open up, and the moods of the individual songs take on new plasticity and tremendous expressive power. The subtle arrangement by Eduard Wesly, the uniquely personal baritone voice of Florian Götz, and the nuanced tonal mixtures of woodwind and strings all contribute equally to this.

A level of sensitivity such that nowhere is good or comforting, such that only in travel does the soul find calm, and hope for the peace of eventual rest: life is lonesome, and society alien. In this recording by Zoltán Megyesi and Balázs Fülei, Schubert’s most famous song cycle can be heard in the original ordering of Wilhelm Müller’s poems, which puts this epochal masterpiece into a new light.