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The Winter Journey at The Kosciuszko Foundation in NYC
December 16, 2018
A recital by Tomasz Konieczny, bass-baritone & Lech Napierala, piano of Franz Schubert's Winterreise, Op. 89 to Stanislaw Baranczak's poetry
A leading bass-baritone Tomasz Konieczny (to perform in Wagner's Ring Cycle and Samson et Dalia at the Metropolitan Opera in March 2019) and awarded pianist Lech Napierala will present: Winter Journey – a recital of Franz Schubert's acclaimed Winterreise, Op. 89 to Stanislaw Baranczak's poetry.
About The Winter Journey:
In 1827, Franz Schubert composed a series of twenty-four songs titled Winterreise (Winter Journey) to the poems of romantic poet Wilhelm Műller, which turned out to be a performed worldwide masterpiece. Acclaimed Polish poet and translator, Stanislaw Baranczak had developed such a fascination with Winterreise that in 1994, he published his own Podróż Zimowa (The Winter Journey), a set of 24 poems (with one exception, original works - not translations) with the intention of performing them together with the Schubert's music.
Stanisław Barańczak has repeatedly studied the anatomy of winter, sometimes putting the sign of equality between the season of the year and modern civilization. The result is an emigrant's quite bitter account of a journey through the winter of his own life, through the memories from the homeland, through a frosty exile to which he had been condemned for most of his adult life. The narrator travels by car, sometimes walks the city streets with headphones in his ears, or flies by plane over agglomerations at altitudes bound by eternal frost. Sometimes he stops at the crossroads, halted by a red light, or sneaks by a lorry driver urinating at a roadside. And these are the only encounters with other people in Podróż Zimowa. The hero is therefore lonely, alienated, estranged, thinking back to the unlovely images of fumes from factory chimneys of his homeland, of yellow snow on dirty Polish roads. A bitter, painful memory...
Podróż zimowa as we discover it, starts increasingly relating to us and surrounding us. Finally, we come to realize this is a tale about us...Deciding to take a journey together with Schubert and Barańczak, we decide to confront the meaning of our own existence. This is a journey into oneself.
The Album Podróż zimowa (Winter Journey) by Schubert/Barańczak was recorded by Tomasz Konieczny, bass-baritone and Lech Napierała, piano in December 2017 and it's premiere performance took place in August 2018 in Warsaw, Poland.
Wednesday, March 20, 2019, 7:30 p.m.
The Kosciuszko Foundation, 15 E 65th Street, NYC
Tickets: $15-$30
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Kosciuszko Foundation
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Founded in 1925, the Kosciuszko Foundation promotes closer ties between Poland and the United States through educational, scientific and cultural exchanges. It awards up to $1 million annually in fellowships and grants to graduate students, scholars, scientists, professionals, and artists, and promotes Polish culture in America. The Foundation has awarded scholarships and provided a forum to Poles who have changed history.
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