WINTERREISE

FRANZ SCHUBERT

“I will sing you a cycle of horrifying songs…”

—Franz Schubert
Franz Schubert’s Winterreise (Winter Journey) is arguably the most influential work for voice and piano of the 19th century. Throughout their performance of this cycle of 24 songs, tenor Christopher Hossfeld and pianist Trevor Berens weave haunting melodies into the story of a homeless stranger traversing a metaphorical winter landscape. Reeling from the horrors of a frozen heart in a frozen world, the stranger bares his most interior and private thoughts in this deeply human psychological struggle of resilience in the face of rejection, death, and trauma. Schubert’s highly sensitive and prophetic music inspires profound empathy, not only for the stranger and his plight, but also for anyone today seeking safety, community, and belonging.

Artists

Christopher Hossfeld
tenor

Christopher Hossfeld is the Director of Music and Ritual and Instructor in Sacred Music at Harvard Divinity School and Music Director at First Parish Church of Stow and Acton in Stow, Massachusetts. His professional experience spans many years as a conductor, composer, vocal performer, and lecturer in academic, church, and community settings. His compositions have been performed at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Toronto Music Garden, and Jordan Hall. He has received commissions from various ensembles, including the Cantata Singers of Ottawa and the Grammy-nominated string orchestra A Far Cry. In Montréal, Québec, he was the conductor and co-artistic director of Opera da Camera and co-founded One Equall Musick, a collaborative vocal ensemble.

Trevor Berens
piano

Trevor Berens is a pianist, composer, and music therapist. His former piano teachers include Tania Flesicher, Peter Miyamoto, and Vicki Ray, and his former composition teachers include Paul Humphreys, Stephen “Lucky” Mosko, Mark Saya, and James Tenney. He enjoys playing the piano in a variety of styles, including avant-garde classical music, traditional classical music, and free improvisation. As a collaborator, he works with solo vocalists and instrumentalists, chamber groups, dancers, and choruses. Trevor is the founder of Sonic Liberation Players, a Boston ensemble specializing in music by modern experimental and avant-garde composers. Trevor runs the Berens Voice and Piano Studio out of Pepperell with his wife, Jessica, works as a music therapist for young children, and is accompanist for the Halalisa Singers and First Parish Church of Stow and Acton.

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