It’s a winter’s night, where I was,
where I’m going,
remembered, imagined …
Samuel Beckett (1906 - 1989), Texts for Nothing No 12

Winter Journey (" Winterreise"), the song cycle by Franz Schubert, is a poetic journey through darkness and isolation, through the freezing surroundings as well as through the cold inner world. The figure of the alienated wanderer, who feels foreign in his own land, and the themes of the inner search, of nostalgia and hope for spring, have a deep resonance with our current time and the reality of the pandemic.

The eight concerts in this program are a reflection on the Schubert cycle. We have invited artists from various genres of current music to present projects and works created during the pandemic, or with a particular relationship to the themes of the original cycle. The result is a contemporary Winter Journey, a journey through the landscape of current musical creation and a dialogue with the past. The eight programs reflect both introspection, memory and remoteness, as well as the hope of a new beginning and the search for the essence of the moment we live in.

However, Winter Journey does not only refer to the content of the programs. It also refers to the situation of artists, the invisibility of culture and the impact of the pandemic on the creative life of many composers and performers. The last song from the original "Winterreise", "The Zanfonist" ("Der Leiermann") is the only one about a musician. The poor old man who plays his instrument barefoot on ice without anyone wanting to hear or see him. Without a doubt, Schubert recognized himself in the image of the marginalized musician, both for his alienation from the world around as well as for his invisibility. 

During the pandemic, the world of culture (and music in particular) has become invisible, and in many cases marginalised. That is why we also wanted to present this Winter Journey as a metaphor of the situation of musicians and composers who have suffered the impact of the pandemic in a particularly existential way. Many of the performers and creators of this cycle are young artists who have been strongly affected by the pandemic at a very important moment in their careers. We want to dedicate this Winter Journey to them. A tribute to the young generation of musicians and composers caught up in this cultural winter - and also a journey towards the light of a new artistic spring.

Desclasificados is formed by Lucia Arnaud and Baldur Brönnimann, and are curators of this programme. Desclasificados is a project that seeks to attract new audiences to classical and contemporary music, and to arouse interest and curiosity in musical expression and creation down through the ages. Opening ears, breaking down barriers and stripping away the mystery surrounding complex content. Declassifying the classics.

Programme
24.02.2021
The Stormmy Morning
Anna Puig, viola; Josep-Ramon Olivé, baritone; Irene Alfageme, piano
Works by Inés Badalo, György Ligeti, Francisco Coll, György Kurtàg, Franz Schubert

31.03.2021
Introspection
Iñaki Alberdi, temperade and microtonal accordeon
Works by Johann Sebastian Bach, Huey Ching Chong, Tomás Luis de Victoria, José Maria Sanchez Verdú, Zuriñe Gerenabarrena, Gabriel Erkoreka

28.04.2021
Digital Solitude
Victor Barceló, percussion
Works by Kaj Duncan David Igor C Silva Terry Riley Isandro Ojeda-Garcia Michael Maierhof

26.05.2021
13 Moons
Menhir (Coco Moya and Iván Cebrián)

30.06.2021
Distances
Kebyart Ensemble, Saxophone Quartet
Works by Igor Stravinsky, Joan Magrané, José Río-Pareja (1973) - Parhelia (2018), 10’ , Franz Schubert, Raquel García-Tomás

29.09.2021
Reflections on Winterreise
Clara de Asís
Premiere

27.10.2021
Emigration
Cuarteto Gerhard 
Works by Roberto Gerhard, Franz Schubert and Oscar Escudero and Belenish Moreno - Gil.

24.11.2021
In Black and White
Composition project for Spanish silent shorts in collaboration with the National Film Library and the Royal Superior Conservatory of Music.