3 Stars in Vienna

Bathed in the warm light of the setting sun, Vienna’s imperial Schönbrunn Palace provides a romantic setting for this open-air concert held shortly before the final match of the Euro 2008 football championship. And shining even more brightly than the palace are the stars of the evening, Anna Netrebko, Rolando Villazón and Plácido Domingo. The trio’s first joint concert, given at Berlin’s Waldbühne for the 2006 football World Cup, was recorded by UNITEL CLASSICA and awarded the Platinum DVD for sales of over 50,000 DVDs in Germany and over 100,000 worldwide. The Schönbrunn concert also broke records with 3.3 million viewers watching the concert live or deferred in Germany and Austria.

Amor, vida de mi vida – The Zarzuela Concert

A typically Spanish musical genre, the zarzuela is a Spanish-language opera with spoken dialogues and filled with pleasant-sounding, often folkloric tunes cast in arias, duets, four-part choruses and dances. While zarzuelas never really made it into the repertoires of theaters outside the Spanish-speaking countries, the many passionate, fiery, or lyrical vocal pieces have continued to thrive in concerts and recitals all over the world. One of the most renowned and ardent supporters of zarzuela melodies is Plácido Domingo, who is featured here in a concert given at the 2007 Salzburg Festival. Belying his 66 years, the world-famous tenor sings these rousing, seductive melodies with the beguiling sweetness of a much younger man. Delicately painted character studies enhanced with occasional harmonic slides, sighing motifs and castanet laughter – Domingo transports the enraptured listener to the calles and plazas of Madrid and Seville.

Paris Concert March 2007 – Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazón

The tension is palpable at Paris’ Théâtre des Champs-Elysées this 28th of March 2007. Anna Netrebko is not only making her debut in France, but she is making it with Rolando Villazón. The ‘dream couple’ of the opera world is about to bring its incomparable charm and magnetism to France’s ‘mélomanes.’ And the result is nothing less than phenomenal: ‘An unforgettable evening, rich in emotions, which many spectators will look back on with nostalgia one day and say: ‘I was there!’. No matter where they appear, Netrebko and Villazón inevitably work their magic on the audience, whether it consists of hundreds or, when broadcast on TV, of millions. For their Paris concert, the duo chose a broad selection of chiefly late-romantic works – the style for which their voices seem to be tailor-made..