A video opera walk through The Hague.
Experience Schubert’s song cycle from Sunday, 16th May individually at your own time and pace in the streets, squares and parks of The Hague
M31 Foundation & OPERA2DAY will present Franz Schubert’s song cycle Winterreise as a video opera walk through The Hague. Along the route there are QR codes with which the visitor can open a film clip on their own smartphone with a song from the cycle, performed by baritone Martijn Cornet and pianist Shuann Chai. Each song becomes an audiovisual poem that enters into a dialogue with the streets, squares and parks of the city. In the songs, a young man tries to regain his balance on foot after a lonely time of distance and alienation. The visitor of Deine Winterreise literally walks with him, experiences the comfort of unforgettable music and, just like the singer, may at the end of the journey let go of the inner winter and dream of a new beginning.
Multidisciplinary director Robin Coops turned this timeless music into a visual experience in the open air, in which the visitor can experience the songs individually and at their own pace. The videos incorporate images of the location, zooming in on parts that reflect the state of mind of the nameless traveler. In this way, each song enters into a dialogue with the environment, with a place that still echoes its history, as it were. The participant experiences first-hand how individual feelings in these songs express a universal lack of human contact. All too recognizable in times of corona.
Robin Coops, the artistic director of M31, is the driving force behind Deine Winterreise. He wanted to develop a form that makes the corona limitations a strength and to experiment with a new presentation form for the classic song. Now the visitor gets the chance to have an intimate live encounter with a singer where that is not physically possible at the moment. He was looking for a collaboration with OPERA2DAY, where he was previously involved with Carmina Burana (2018) and A Bite at the Opera-The Fairy Queen (2020). OPERA2DAY’s Serge van Veggel advised on the artistic development of Deine Winterreise and the musical direction is in the hands of Hernán Schvartzman.
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