12 Ensemble present a double-bill of Schubert at Bold Tendencies' summer Euphoria programme

In his string quartets written on the edge of death, Schubert reaches a state of almost ecstatic vision. Here, his music hovers between agony and rapture, and vast shifting landscapes of sound and colour speak of a composer glimpsing eternity. We are pleased to be joined by 12 Ensemble, one of Europe’s most exceptional string orchestras, in this one-off double bill. The first installment, Schubert Schubert (Death and the Maiden), presents their own magnificent and radical arrangement for full string orchestra of String Quartet No. 14 in D minor (1824) - here euphoria emerges not despite the music’s intensity but because of it; stark contrasts sharpen the listening experience into a state of almost unbearable clarity.

The late concert Schubert Schubert (PARTYSZENEN) features his final String Quartet No. 15 in G major (1826) realised in its original scoring by the 12 Ensemble’s principal players. Here clarity dissolves into something expansive and unstable—a shifting, volatile landscape where euphoria is fleeting and precarious… surges that feel both boundless and on the brink of collapse. It will be preceded by PARTYSZENEN, a new work by composer Isabella Gellis, providing a contemporary invocation of ‘a serene delusion’, and written with Schubert in mind.