Winterreise

Christian Spuck is from Marburg and was trained at the John Cranko School in Stuttgart. He began his dance career with Jan Lauwers’ Needcompany and Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker’s ensemble "Rosas". In 1995 he joined the Stuttgart Ballet and served as the company’s resident choreographer from 2001 to 2012. In Stuttgart, he created fifteen world premieres, including the narrative ballets "Lulu. Eine Monstretragödie" after Frank Wedekind, "Der Sandmann", and "Das Fräulein von S." after E.T.A. Hoffmann. In addition, Christian Spuck has worked with numerous prominent ballet companies across Europe and the USA. For the Royal Ballet of Flanders, he created "The Return of Ulysses" in 2006, and at the Norwegian National Ballet in Oslo, "Woyzeck" after Georg Büchner was premiered. His ballet "Die Kinder" at Aalto Ballett Essen was nominated for the Prix Benois de la Danse; the ballet "Leonce und Lena", also premiered in Essen and based on Georg Büchner, was taken up by the Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal, Charlotte Ballet, USA, the Czech National Ballet in Prague, and the Stuttgart Ballet. The premiere of "Poppea//Poppea" for Gauthier Dance at Theaterhaus Stuttgart in 2010 was selected by Dance Europe magazine as one of the ten most successful dance productions worldwide and was awarded the German theater prize Der Faust 2011 as well as the Italian "Danza/Danza Award." Christian Spuck has also directed operas: following Gluck’s "Orphée et Euridice" at the Stuttgart State Opera, he staged Verdi’s "Falstaff" at the Staatstheater Wiesbaden, as well as Berlioz’ "La damnation de Faust" and Wagner’s "The Flying Dutchman" at the Deutsche Oper Berlin. From 2012 to 2023, Christian Spuck was director of the Zürich Ballet. There he created choreographies for "Romeo and Juliet", "Leonce und Lena", "Woyzeck", "Der Sandmann", "Messa da Requiem", "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King", "Sleeping Beauty", and "Monteverdi". The ballet "Anna Karenina", premiered in Zurich in 2014 and based on Leo Tolstoy, was added to the repertoire in Oslo, at the Moscow Stanislavski Theatre, by the Korean National Ballet, and the Bavarian State Ballet. In 2018, Spuck’s ballet "Winterreise" premiered in Zurich, earning him the Prix Benois de la Danse in 2019. In 2019, the Zürich Ballet staged Helmut Lachenmann’s "Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern", recognized as "Production of the Year" and "Company of the Year" by tanz magazine. For the Moscow Bolshoi Theatre, he created the ballet "Orlando" after Virginia Woolf in 2021. His "Messa da Requiem" was not only invited to the Adelaide Festival in Australia but also adopted by Het Nationale Oper & Ballet Amsterdam and the Finnish National Ballet. Since the beginning of the 2023/24 season, Christian Spuck has been the artistic director of the Staatsballett Berlin.

Der italienische Dirigent und Komponist Emilio Pomàrico wurde in Buenos Aires geboren. Er gilt heute als einer der führenden Interpreten zeitgenössischer Musik. Regelmässig ist er auf renommierten internationalen Festivals sowie in den bedeutendsten Opern- und Konzerthäusern der Welt zu Gast. Von Beginn seiner Dirigentenkarriere an hat er sich unermüdlich für die Werke einer jungen Komponistengeneration eingesetzt. Mit einigen der bedeutendsten Komponisten unserer Zeit sind enge künstlerische Bindungen entstanden, so mit Georges Aperghis, Luciano Berio, Friedrich Cerha, Elliott Carter, Niccolo Castiglioni, Franco Donatoni, Hugues Dufourt, Brian Ferneyhough, Gerard Grisey, Georg Friedrich Haas, Helmut Lachenmann, Luigi Nono, Emmanuel Nunes, Wolfgang Rihm, Salvatore Sciarrino, Iannis Xenakis und Hans Zender. Emilio Pomàrico hat zahlreiche CD-Aufnahmen bei den Labels Neos, Wergo, Kairos und EMC vorgelegt. Kommende Engagements führen ihn u.a. zur Deutschen Radio Philharmonie, zum SWR-Sinfonieorchester, zum WDR-Sinfonieorchester, zum Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France und zum Gürzenich-Orchester Köln. Weitere Konzerte gibt er mit dem Collegium Novum Zürich, dem Musikfabrik Ensemble, dem Ensemble Resonanz, dem Contrechamps Ensemble und dem Remix Ensemble. Opernproduktionen führen ihn nach Dijon, an die Pariser Opéra Comique und zu den Festivals von Aix-en-Provence und Avignon.

Rufus Didwiszus studierte Bühnen- und Kostümbild in Stuttgart bei Jürgen Rose und ar­bei­­tet seither als freier Bühnenbildner in Theater-, Opern- und Tanz­produktio­­­nen, u. a. mit Barrie Kosky (La Belle Hélène, Die Perlen der Cleopatra und Anatevka an der Komischen Oper Berlin; La fan­ciul­la del West, Die Gezeichneten und Boris Godunow am Opernhaus Zü­­­rich; Orphée aux enfers, Salzburger Festspiele; Fürst Igor, Opéra de Paris; Der Ro­senkavalier, Bayerische Staatsoper), Tho­mas Ostermeier (u.a. Shop­pen &Ficken in der Baracke des Deutschen Theaters Berlin mit Einladung zum Berliner Theatertreffen und nach Avignon; Der blaue Vogel am Deutschen Theater, Feuergesicht am Schauspiel­haus Hamburg, Der Name bei den Salzburger Festspielen und an der Ber­li­ner Schau­­bühne, The Girl on the Sofa beim Edinburgh Interna­tio­nal Festival und an der Schaubühne, Vor Son­nen­­auf­gang an den Münchner Kammer­spie­len), Sasha Waltz, Tom Kühnel, Christian Stückl, Stefan Larsson, Tomas Alfredson und Christian Lollike. Seit 2004 entwirft und inszeniert Rufus Didwiszus mit Joanna Dud­ley eigene Musik-Theater-Performances, u. a. in den So­phien­sae­len, an der Schaubühne und im Ra­dial­system in Berlin sowie im BO­ZAR in Brüssel. Mit seiner Band «Friedrichs» war er in Der weisse Wolf am Staats­theater Stuttgart zu sehen. Zudem war er als Gastdozent an der Aka­­demie der Bildenden Künste München und an der Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weissensee tätig. Für Christian Spuck entstanden die Bühnenbilder zu Der fliegende Hol­län­­der an der Deutschen Oper Berlin, Nussknacker und Mause­könig, Winter­reise, Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern,  Dornröschen und Monteverdi beim Ballett Zürich sowie Orlando am Moskauer Bolschoitheater.

Emma Ryott is from England and works internationally as a costume and set designer. Since 2003, she has collaborated with Christian Spuck in ballet and opera. Their joint ballet projects include "The Little Match Girl", "Winterreise", "Messa da Requiem", "Anna Karenina", and "Romeo and Juliet" in Zurich; "Lulu. Eine Monstretragödie" and "Das Fräulein von S." in Stuttgart; "Woyzeck" in Oslo and Zurich; "Leonce und Lena" in Montreal, Stuttgart, Zurich, and Prague; "Der Sandmann" in Stuttgart and Zurich; and "The Return of Ulysses" in Antwerp. In opera, they have worked on "The Flying Dutchman" and "La damnation de Faust" at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, "Falstaff" in Wiesbaden, and "Orfeo ed Euridice" in Stuttgart. Other opera productions include "Mathis der Maler" at the Theater an der Wien, "Manon Lescaut" at the English National Opera, "Otello" at the Salzburg Festival, "La damnation de Faust" and "The Great Gatsby" at the Semperoper Dresden, "Marco Polo" at the Guangzhou Opera, "Das Rheingold" and "Die Walküre" at the Longborough Festival, "La bohème" at the Copenhagen Opera Festival, "Roméo et Juliette" in Malmö and at the Savonlinna Opera Festival, and "Orfeo" at the Opéra du Rhin. Their theater work has taken them from the Royal Shakespeare Company through Toronto and the National Theatre London to London’s West End and the New York Broadway. For the globally broadcast 2020 New Year’s Concert of the Vienna Philharmonic, Emma Ryott designed the ballet costumes. Additional ballet projects include "Cinderella" at the Finnish National Ballet, as well as Christian Spuck’s "Orlando" and Yuri Possokhov’s "The Seagull" at the Moscow Bolshoi Theatre.

Martin Gebhardt was lighting designer and master electrician for John Neumeier’s Hamburg Ballet. From 2002 onward he collaborated with Heinz Spoerli and Ballett Zürich. Ballet productions of both companies took him to renowned theatres across Europe, Asia, and the Americas. At Zurich Opera House he created the lighting design for productions by Jürgen Flimm, David Alden, Jan Philipp Gloger, Grischa Asagaroff, Matthias Hartmann, David Pountney, Moshe Leiser/Patrice Caurier, Damiano Michieletto, and Achim Freyer. At the Salzburg Festival he designed the lighting for "La bohème" and for a new version of Spoerli’s "Der Tod und das Mädchen". Since the 2012/13 season Martin Gebhardt has been Head of Lighting at Zurich Opera House. He maintains a close collaboration with choreographer Christian Spuck (including "Winterreise", "Nussknacker und Mausekönig", "Messa da Requiem", "Anna Karenina", "Woyzeck", "Der Sandmann", "Leonce und Lena", "Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern"). He has also worked as lighting designer for choreographers Edward Clug (including "Strings", "Le Sacre du printemps" and "Faust" in Zurich), Alexei Ratmansky, Wayne McGregor, Marco Goecke, and Douglas Lee. He collaborated with Christoph Marthaler and Anna Viebrock on Handel’s "Sale" and Rossini’s "Il viaggio a Reims" in Zurich as well as on "Lulu" at the Hamburg State Opera, and with Jossi Wieler and Sergio Morabito at the Grand Théâtre de Genève for "Les Huguenots". In 2023 he designed the lighting for Spuck’s ballet "Bovary" at Staatsballett Berlin and in 2024 for Rossini’s "Tancredi" at the Bregenz Festival. He was also the lighting designer for Cathy Marston’s "Atonement" at Zurich Opera House.