Together with Richard Strauss and Arnold Schönberg, NBE explores the many faces of love: romantic longing and its confrontation with harsh reality. The program features the light and graceful Serenade alongside the deeper, more expansive Suite by the young Strauss. In contrast, we present a compelling arrangement of Verklärte Nacht — Schönberg’s deeply moving musical rendering of a nocturnal confession filled with guilt, forgiveness and inner transformation.
For the first time, NBE performs a full programme exclusively for winds. It is an exciting exploration of new colours — of what lies hidden behind the original orchestrations, and of what happens when breath, wood and brass carry the full expressive weight.
The young writer Maud Vanhauwaert reflects in short interludes on what the love and vulnerability of Verklärte Nacht might mean in our own time: tenderness as strength, understanding as resistance, silence as an answer. Her poetic texts form a contemporary countervoice — a soft, clear sound set against loud clichés.
We immerse ourselves wholeheartedly in longing — and in the uncomfortable reality that comes with it.
