Concert: Songs of Schumann and Britten

Tenor Christopher Hossfeld and pianist Trevor Berens perform Schumann’s Dichterliebe and Britten’s Who Are These Children? ABOUT THE PROGRAM: UUCAV Music Director Christopher Hossfeld and accompanist Trevor Berens present an afternoon of art song featuring two remarkable song cycles: Robert Schumann’s Dichterliebe (A Poet’s Love) and Benjamin Britten’s Who Are These Children? Schumann’s Dichterliebe, composed in 1840 to poems by Heinrich Heine, traces an intimate emotional journey through love, longing, bitterness, memory, and loss. One of the defining works of the Romantic song repertoire, the cycle will be performed in its original German. Britten’s Who Are These Children? sets poems by Scottish poet William Soutar. Written in English and Scots, the cycle moves between playful glimpses of childhood and darker reflections on violence, suffering, and the cost of war. Together, the two works offer contrasting musical worlds while sharing an extraordinary sensitivity to poetry and to the complexity of human experience. ABOUT THE PERFORMERS: Christopher Hossfeld is Music Director at UUCAV and Director of Music and Ritual and Instructor in Sacred Music at Harvard Divinity School. His professional work spans conducting, composition, vocal performance, and teaching in academic, church, and community settings. His compositions have been performed at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Toronto Music Garden, and Jordan Hall, and by ensembles including the Cantata Singers of Ottawa and the Grammy-nominated string orchestra A Far Cry. While living in Montréal, he was conductor and co-artistic director of Opera da Camera and co-founded the collaborative vocal ensemble One Equall Musick. Trevor Berens is accompanist at UUCAV, as well as a pianist, composer, and music therapist. His work ranges from traditional and avant-garde classical music to free improvisation, and he collaborates with singers, instrumentalists, chamber ensembles, dancers, and choruses. Trevor is the founder of Sonic Liberation Players, a Boston-based ensemble specializing in modern experimental and avant-garde music. He runs the Berens Voice and Piano Studio in Pepperell with his wife, Jessica, works as a music therapist for young children, and is also accompanist for the Halalisa Singers. Music at UUCAV Unitarian Universalist Congregation in the Assabet Valley 353 Great Road, Stow, MA 01775 uucav.org/music