The Nutcracker

Peter Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker” is certainly one of the most popular “family” ballets in the world. This production from the Semperoper combines the work’s fairy-tale aspects with visual opulence. Based on the original libretto by Marius Petipa, the choreography by Aaron S. Watkin and Jason Beechey is modern yet traditional. The spirited dancing, charming sets inspired by Dresden landmarks, and extravagant costumes make the production a joy to behold. The production entrusts the roles of the children in the first act to actual children and youths from Dresden’s famous Palucca School of Dance.

Eugene Onegin

Young conductor Omer Meir Wellber, Musical Director of Valencia’s Palau de les Arts, scores a triumph with Tchaikovsky’s “Eugene Onegin” in Mariusz Trelinski’s timeless production. Polish filmmaker and stage directo Trelinski has created a series of dream-like, surrealist tableaux of great suggestive beauty. The clear lines of the production (premiered at Warsaw’s Teatr Wielki) are finely echoed by the slender musical design of Omer Meir Wellber – “A miracle of poetry” (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung). The superb young cast is headed by Artur Ruzinski as Onegin and Kristine Opolais as Tatyana.

Tchaikovsky, Symphony No.5 in E minor, op.64

Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony was recorded at the Tanglewood Festival in 1974 in honor of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Serge Koussevitzky. Leonard Bernstein conducted the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Tchaikovsky’s Fifth was one of Koussevitzky’s warhorses during the many years in which he led the Boston Symphony. “It was like Koussevitzky’s signature, his theme song, one of his national hymns, and I felt his presence on stage very strongly.” (Leonard Bernstein)

Tchaikovsky, Symphony No.4 in F minor, op.36

Winner of a prestigious Emmy Award in 1976, Leonard Bernstein’s recording of Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony with the New York Philharmonic captures the full drama and emotional depth of the work. Filmed live at Avery Fisher Hall on 24 April 1975, the concert was an overwhelming success. Bernstein returned to the Fourth again and again, and conducted it in 1989 in his last appearance at Avery Fisher Hall. Critics called this interpretation “rivetingly, definitively manic-depressive”. He had come to identify as closely with Tchaikovsky as he had with Mahler, and gave searingly intense interpretations of both composers.

Tchaikovsky, Violin Concerto in D major, op.35

Along with Mendelssohn’s violin concerto, Tchaikovsky’s Opus 35 has become one of the most popular concertos in the world. But this was not always so. When it was first performed in Vienna on 4 December 1881, it was almost unanimously rejected by the press and said to “stink in the ear”. The first two movements are marked by a tender lyricism that wonderfully brings out the violin’s songful qualities. The third movement, an Allegro vivacissimo, launches into a fireworks of virtuoso display that concludes the work on a dazzling note. Recorded with the New York Philharmonic under Leonard Bernstein at New York’s Avery Fisher Hall in 1975, this performance of Tchaikovsky’s beloved violin concerto marked the U.S. debut of the Israeli violinist Boris Belkin, who has since performed with all the leading orchestras of the world and under such eminent conductors as Maazel, Muti, Haitink and Mehta.

Eugene Onegin

Czech director Petr Weigl shot the opera in authentic locations in northwest Russia. Czech actors depict the tragic love story to the music of the opera recorded under the musical direction of Sir Georg Solti, one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century.

New Year’s Eve Concert 1979

Gaiety and temperament are the keynotes of this New Year’s Eve program with the London Philharmonic Orchestra recorded live in Munich’s Herkulessaal on New Year’s Eve 1979. It begins with “Gaieté Parisienne,” an arrangement of Jacques Offenbach’s most popular operetta melodies. This is followed by a generous helping of central European esprit in the Slavonically inspired dances of Léo Delibes’ “Coppélia” ballet, and in the Viennese lightness of Franz von Suppé’s “Pique Dame” Overture, a delicious little work by the founding father of the Viennese operetta. Amilcare Ponchielli’s “Dance of the Hours” has delighted “promenade” concertgoers for years now – perhaps because it reminds us of his two great pupils Puccini and Mascagni? The luscious lyricism of the waltzes from Richard Strauss’s “Rosenkavalier” is dispelled by the solemn majesty of Sir Edward Elgar’s “Pomp and Circumstance March No. 4.” From Victorian England we travel to Czarist St. Petersburg, to the magical world of Peter I. Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker Suite.” And since all good things must come to an end, the Land of Sweets disappears under a vigorous sprinkling of fiery paprika in Johannes Brahms’s “Hungarian Dance No. 5,” which closes the program on a spicy note.

World Orchestra for Peace at the Abu Dhabi Festival

For this concert of the World Orchestra for Peace at the Abu Dhabi Festival, conductor Valery Gergiev, head of St. Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theater and principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, has put together a program that includes major works by two of his favorite composers, Prokofiev and Tchaikovsky. With the World Orchestra for Peace, Gergiev has at his command an orchestra that is truly remarkable from every point of view. It is not only put together of the best musicians from the best orchestras of the world; the orchestra, which was established by Sir Georg Solti in 1995, also pursues a very special goal: to “reaffirm the unique strength of music as an ambassador for peace”. The concerts given by this ensemble, whose musicians are all actively engaged in their respective orchestras, are rare but exquisite and highly appreciated events.