William Berger has written article for The Arts Desk exploring the personal sentiment and the development of the programme for his debut recital CD Insomnia: A Nocturnal Voyage in Song. The programme ties together works from composers including Mozart, Liszt, Wolf, Rodney Bennett, Raymond Yiu and more. Conveying “what a deeply personal expression this programme was and continues to be”, the article outlines the journey that develops throughout the song cycle, “of a young man yearning for a lost love during a restless, sleepless night”.

Developed as a programmatic recital, the cycle follows a progression from “odes to the beauty of the night”, before a turn to “death and darker things” with dreams haunted with the thought of his unresponsive lover. This pain in the darker turmoil is described by William as something that everyone can feel- “We have all felt the pain of a broken heart at some point in our lives. Indeed, it is part of the human condition”.

William comments that there is a certain ambiguity as to whether the absent lover is dead or alive, whether it is an unrequited love or whether her silence denotes the end of a relationship. He admits that the story has “kept changing over time” even for him, and will continue to be interpreted by each listener individually.

To celebrate the CD’s release in South Africa, William will give a recital of the programme on September 21st.

To read the full article, please visit The Arts Desk.