Winter Journey

Roderick Williams makes a long-overdue return to the Howard Assembly Room with pianist Joseph Middleton to perform Jeremy Sams’ wonderfully communicative English translation of Winterreise.

Winterreise (Winter Journey) is a song cycle for voice and piano by Franz Schubert. Completed in 1827, it’s a set of 24 songs for voice and piano composed almost entirely using minor keys. The lyrics are poems by Wilhelm Müller and tell the story of a lonely traveller who ventures out into the snow on a journey to rid himself of his lost love.

“Winterreise sung in English will be a new experience for many of the audience”, says Middleton. “I was bowled over playing it for Roddy at our last concert: the English text made Schubert’s music so much more immediate, and the audience was transfixed”.