POLISH PREMIERE
Creators: Łukasz Konieczny, Boris Randzio, Nikolaus Rexroth
Direction: Łukasz Konieczny, Boris Randzio
Text: Wilhelm Müller, Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński
Music: Franz Schubert
Idea, concept, inscenisation, selection of texts, translation, vocal - bass: Łukasz Konieczny
Choreography, inscenisation, translation, dance: Boris Randzio
Piano: Nikolaus Rexroth
Costumes: Agnieszka Ścibor
Video: Piotr Opawski, Łukasz Konieczny
Light: Boris Randzio
Cast: Łukasz Konieczny, Boris Randzio, Nikolaus Rexroth
Idea / Inspiration for Baczyński Poetry Mission: Michael Sturm, Małgorzata Oleszkiewicz
Premiere: 28.11.2023, Into the Open - Music Festival, Kühlhaus, Berlin
Date: 1.09.2024 / Sunday
Time: 7 pm
Place: Stage, Art Factory in Lodz, 3 Tymienieckiego Street
Tickets: 30 PLN (reduced) / 40 PLN (regular)
Tickets purchase: from July 29, 2024 / via kicket.com portal (online payment) / at the festival office (payment in cash or contactless card payment)
Duration: 90 minutes (no intermissions)
Viewers' age: no limitations
Performance in Polish and German
After the event we invite the viewers to a meeting and discussion with the artists
The discussion will be led by Małgorzata Jabłońska
The discussion will be held in Polish
DESCRIPTION OF THE PERFORMANCE
"Eine Winterreise / Winter Journey. Shubert / Müller / Baczyński" is a multi-dimensional project in 24 images/scenes/songs, where the music of Franz Schubert and the poems of Wilhelm Müller intertwine with the poetry of Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński. It is a lonely journey into the depths of the human soul and its darkest abysses, and a pursuit of light that turns into ultimate darkness.
Where is the sun, where is the light, where is the warmth, and where is life when there is an awakening?
Three young people with timeless questions about themselves and their present find no answers. The burden of reality is too heavy for them, but the power of longing for a world that knows love is still alive. These are people immersed in melancholy, surrounded by thoughts of death, which constantly accompanies them, yet illuminated by the ray of hope. Franz Schubert and Wilhelm Müller - marked by illness. Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński - a Polish poet, exhausted by war, dying in 1944, in the Warsaw Uprising, at the age of 23. Their biographies were intertwined with oppressive times and emotional suffering. What is left is the single most important cry - for humanity and the meaning of life.
Life flees from the bodies of Schubert and Müller, and their minds comment as if both, in the last 24 hours of their own existence, were the only companions for each other. A different perspective emerges from Baczyński's words. It is the gaze of a young man who, through the intensity of his poetry, lends strength and soul to life. Schubert travels towards eternal winter. Baczyński remains in summer. Nonlove - not to love. It hangs over him like fate. That is why he passionately follows the most important primal force, to which he wants to return - love.
Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński's works are almost completely unknown in the German-speaking world. To mark the 80th anniversary of his death and the 80th anniversary of the outbreak of the Warsaw Uprising, we would like to change this and - with the performance "Winterreise" - encourage the creation of German-language translations of his masterpieces. Baczyński's poetry is like light and colour - it is emotionally touching and unique.
In the Winterreise play, the Singer is an anonymous person, a metaphorical character who confronts the present, while simultaneously trying to escape from it. The Dancer is his alter ego, his sparring partner, who plays the role of God and the Devil, and of love and death. They both try to describe and make sense of the present with all its catastrophes, the destruction of the planet, wars, migrations, chaos and famine.
INFORMATION ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Lukasz Konieczny - bass, was born in Lodz, Poland and studied singing at the Music Academy in Wroclaw. Master classes with renowned singers and pedagogues such as Prof. Christian Elsner, Deborah Polaski, Franz Grundheber, Linda Watson, David Syrus as well as acting courses at the International Film School Cologne completed his education. In the years 2011 - 2019 he was a member of the ensemble of the Deutsche Oper am Rhein. His repertoire includes the Mozart parts of Bartolo ("Le nozze di Figaro"), Masetto and Il Commendatore ("Don Giovanni"), or Sarastro ("Die Zauberflöte"), as well as roles such as Zuniga (Bizet "Carmen"), Crespel/Luther (Offenbach "Les Contes d'Hoffmann"), Rocco (Beethoven "Fidelio"), Barone Douphol (Verdi "La traviata"), Sparafucile (Verdi "Rigoletto"), Banco (Verdi "Macbeth"), Bonzo (Puccini "Madama Butterfly"), Fafner (Wagner "Rheingold" and "Siegfried"), Hunding (Wagner "Walküre"), Truffaldin (Strauss "Ariadne auf Naxos") or Dr. Behrens in the world premiere of Pawel Mykietyn's "Der Zauberberg" in Poznan at the Malta Festival and at the Festival SacrumProfanum in Krakow. Konieczny's repertoire also includes bass parts in important concert works such as Beethoven's 9th Symphony, Mozart's Requiem und Coronation Mass, Dvorak's Requiem, Mendelssohn's "Paulus" or Penderecki's Polish Requiem.
Guest appearances have taken him to the Handel Festival in Halle as Polifemo in "Acis and Galatea", to the Mainfrankentheater in Würzburg as Rocco, to the Hamburg State Opera as Sparafucile and to the Munich Opera Festival as Douphol. At the Dresden Semperoper Lukasz Konieczny appeared in 2017/18 as Crespel/Luther and Lodovico in Verdi's "Otello" and as Il Re in Verdi's "Aida" at Dubai Opera together with the National Opera Warsaw. In 2019/20 he returned to the Bavarian State Opera as Reinmar von Zweter in Wagner's "Tannhäuser" and as Sparafucile in Verdi's "Rigoletto" at the National Opera Warsaw.
Lukasz Konieczny has recently appeared as Rocco "Fidelio" at the Baltic Opera in Danzig, as Sarastro "Die Zauberflöte" at the Festival of the German Language in the Theater Bad Lauchstädt, as Colline in Puccini's "La bohème" at the National Opera in Warsaw and as Fafner in Wagner's "Siegfried" at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, in "Rheingold" and "Siegfried" during the Wagner Days in Müpa Budapest under the button of Ádám Fischer and in the premiere of "Rheingold" in the Esplanade Concert Hall in Singapore. Lukasz Konieczny's next engagements follow, among others, as Sparafucile in Verdi's "Rigoletto", in Puccini "Gianni Schicchi" at German National Theatre Weimar, in Weber's "Freischütz" during the Eutiner Festspiele 2024 and with a staged version of Schubert's "Winterreise".
