Tag: piano

Winterreise – A Winter’s Journey

A winter – themed post on this frosty morning. Excerpts from my book of illustrations inspired by the Schubert song cycle.

In 2016 I was inspired to create these illustrations by the wonderful imagery contained in Winterreise. This timeless song cycle for voice and piano, composed by Franz Schubert, was published in 1828. It consists of a setting of 24 poems by Wilhelm Muller. I produced a set of illustrations which are presented alongside Muller’s words, translated into English by Celia Sgroi. The resulting book can be purchased direct from myself. The original illustrations and giclee prints are also available. Email me for further details.

The illustrations are now also available to view on https://winterreise.online/. The site is the work of the wonderful Iain C Phillips, and is an amazing resource for all things Winterreise, including discography, texts and papers, along with other illustrations and artworks.

Below are some of the illustrations from my book, along with excerpts from the poems.

I cannot choose the time

To begin my journey,

Must find my own way

In this darkness.

Frozen drops are falling

Down from my cheeks.

How could I not have noticed

That I have been weeping?

In a charcoal-burner’s tiny house

I have found shelter;

But my limbs won’t relax,

Their hurts burn so much.

You, too, my heart, in strife and storm

So wild and so bold,

Feel first in the silence your serpent

Stir with burning sting!

So I travelled my road

Onward with sluggish feet,

Through bright, happy life,

Lonely and unrecognised.

A light does a friendly dance before me,

I follow it here and there;

I like to follow it and watch

The way it lures the wanderer.

Ah, a man as wretched as I am

Is glad to fall for the merry trick

That, beyond ice and night and fear,

Shows him a bright, warm house.

And a loving soul within –

Only illusion lets me win!

My way has led me

to a graveyard;

Here I’ll stop,

I told myself.

You green and mourning garlands

must be the sign

That invites weary travellers

into the cool inn.


Song: Schubert: The Winterreise D911: I good night
Artist: Christoph Prégardien & Andreas Staier
Licensed to YouTube by WMG (on behalf of Teldec Classics International)

The book was first published in 2016 by LKL Publishing and is available direct from the author.

Illustrations © 2016 David Armitage

ISBN 978-1-5262-0322-9.

Translation courtesy of Celia Sgroi © 2005

I have also illustrated many successful childrens books, such as the Lighthouse Keeper series and Queen of the Night. See Illustration in the header menu.

Individual original abstract paintings have also been inspired by particular pieces of music. You can see more of these in the Music Box category, under My Artworks.

Studio Shows 2

Episode 2

Working across different disciplines adds an element of confusion to the casual studio visitor, or, in one case it was somebody who wanted to see some work for a local show. Being familiar with the range of my children’s illustrations, the first thing she saw in the studio were several very large non-figurative paintings and lots of smaller ones. Puzzlement and doubt abounded. There was nothing cozy about these things. Had she come to the right place? How to extricate herself?


This was symptomatic of the reaction of many visitors and has led to me providing a brief tutorial in order to clarify this. Let’s start with the ‘abstract’ stuff.

My explanation was, and is, by invitation only otherwise the listeners boredom levels would be severely tested. Their interest was genuine and any hint of a patronising attitude from me would be spotted at once.

The gist of my riveting talk turned on learning the history and the language (or lack of it) of painting. As it is with literacy or numeracy or musical notation or culinary techniques, the study of these things is crucial.
Otherwise, without the background knowledge of ‘reading’ paintings then the the lure of conventional pedestrian ‘proper pictures’ in all their tedium prevails.

Does one tackle this with a barrage of words? Heaven forbid.
Consider this. After having enjoyed a play, or a novel, or a collection of poems, would you like to see a series of pictures to further increase one’s understanding? Or, conversely, does the visual experience have to be translated into mountains of words? Of course not. I once had a show where the only words were ‘fire exit’, and that was because it was compulsory. As somebody said ‘painting is about painting, everything else is about everything else.’ Quite so. Study it, learn about it, look at it, and even try it. Then forget the words.

There is an art to writing about art, some of which can become so wrapped up in itself it becomes incomprehensible. I like to call this ‘Art Bollocks’. For an irreverant post on this subject click here!

As previously mentioned, illustrating childrens books has been quite a successful venture. And along with Ronda’s superior literary skill our Lighthouse Keeper books have kept us both busy for over 40 years. Being published by Scholastic they have been a hit in schools, with hundreds of lighthouses being crafted by kids all over the world!

Some years ago, Ronda and I were doing a school visit in London. For some reason, we worked with the kids in a lecture theatre, at the end of which was a grand piano. It was lunchtime and I was on my own finishing off some session pictures for my young audience. At some point a young man appeared, asked if I minded if he did a rehearsal on the piano. ‘Of course not’, I replied, ‘can I come and see?’ He was doing that wonderful warhorse, the piano part in Beethoven 5, a piece I had known since I was about 4 years old. His concert date was pretty close. He was nervous.
He had umpteen goes at the start of the rondo. I approached the piano. ‘Look at this,’ he said, gesturing to the left hand page. He played a bit. ‘Now look at the right,’ he said.
‘You can see the problem! Bloody difficult, fancy a go?’
Of course, I could not see it at all. All I saw was a series of black marks on a piece of white paper. He looked at these marks and his head filled with music. This language was incomprehensible to me. My head filled with nothing. Not a hope. The music of top class painting is the same. It is wordless and deeply affecting.

From musescore.com

And of course, the dross of the ordinary in this venture is just as evident and as easy to spot. There is acres of it. This can be very confusing. Online websites are full of the stuff, so much of it is of spellbinding mediocrity. More explanation required….

Go back to Episode 1 of Studio Shows

[A coda: Back to the lecture theatre type experience with the children….

Making images for children is wonderfully unequivocal and almost totally wordless. The scene is a draughty assembly hall. 200 kids, years 1 and 2 are settled down and expecting a good show. So, get to work and then grab them and hold them, but be quick about it. Do that and the rapport is a kind of silent and magical electricity. The children almost take all the oxygen out of the air. At the end, nobody wants to leave, including me and the teachers. If you are not up to it, death is not lingering, it is immediate and horribly final . Children don’t mess around with platitudes. This activity is not for the faint-hearted.
In which case, go and do something else…..]