Composition Commission issued to Isabel Mundry

Opernhaus Graz GmbH, Graz, Austria

In 1827, a year before his death, Franz Schubert came to the Styrian capital of Graz on his last long journey. After visiting the city he wrote to his hostess: “[…] At Graz I soon recognized an artless and sincere way of being together (…) Above all I shall never forget the friendly shelter where (…) I spent the happiest days I have had for a long time.”

At Graz Opera House’s ballet evening entitled “Und der Himmel so weit” (And Heaven So Far) Franz Schubert now becomes the imaginary guest in Graz. Not only is his symphonic work honored here. The evening also includes a selection of his lieder: “An die Musik” (To Music), “Götter Griechenlands” (Gods of Greece) and “An den Mond” (To the Moon). With the support of the EvS Music Foundation the piano lieder will be transformed for the Graz Philharmonic Orchestra by the composer Isabel Mundry. The singing part will be transferred here to instrumental tonal structures. This will not be a conventional arrangement but rather a contemporary take on Schubert’s work which can be experienced in a new way in all its topicality and radicality.

This means we have, on the one hand, Schubert’s original symphonic work, in the middle Isabel Mundry’s treatment of the lieder and, on the other, her newly composed passages that are still based on the lieder but take on their own tonal language. Choreography and contemporary composition dovetail here inextricably as Isabel Mundry and choreographer Jörg Weinöhl jointly develop the interplay of both levels.

April 1, 6, 9, 14, 17, 20, 29, 2016 and
May 1/13, 2016
Graz Opera House

Further Information
www.oper-graz.com