Four documentaries about the some of the greatest conductors of all time, Herbert von Karajan, Sir Georg Solti, Leonard Bernstein and Carlos Kleiber Available on Blu-ray for the first time. BD 1 Carlos Kleiber – I am lost to the World; BD 2 Sir Georg Solti – Journey of a lifetime + Solti conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestra; BD 3 Leonard Bernstein – Larger Than Life (prizewinning Documentary); BD 4 Herbert von Karajan – Maestro for the Screen + Karajan conducts Berliner Philharmoniker
Carlos Kleiber – I am lost to the world
Carlos Kleiber, the eccentric and reclusive conductor par excellence, is remembered as much for the rarity of his appearances as for the brilliance of his interpretations. In marked contrast to his contemporary Herbert von Karajan, Kleiber refused to participate in the international music business – as well as in most interviews. Accordingly, Kleiber the Man and Kleiber the Musician have remained an elusive mystery that this new documentary, following extensive research amongst the conductor´s musical companions, collaborators and friends, sheds light upon. Featuring Riccardo Muti, Otto Schenk, Ioan Hollender, Sir Peter Jonas, Michael Gielen, Ileana Cotrubas and many more as interview partners as well as several musical excerpts of previously unseen footage. “What the film … conveys is the tremendous emotion that Kleiber produced in people or, rather, that he stirred up in them.” (Süddeutsche Zeitung)
New Year’s Concert 1989
For the 30th anniversary of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra’s New Year’s concerts, Carlos Kleiber appeared at the conductor’s podium to conduct his first Strauss family extravaganza. “What Carlos Kleiber presents here is the fulfillment of all waltz dreams,” wrote the trade magazine “Fono Forum.” All the beloved Viennese melodies such as the “Fledermaus” overture, the “Accelerationen” waltz, “Bei uns zu Haus,” “Csardas,” “Pizzicato Polka” and, of course, the “Blue Danube” waltz and the “Radetzky March” – all these Viennese warhorses took on an unexpected elegance, spirit and wit. Kleiber’s rubati and accelerandi, his sensitivity towards everything that is found between the staves of the music invest these pieces with a new urgency. Pieces that we thought were so overplayed as to be trite and meaningless assume a freshness and vitality that is nothing less than amazing. “There won’t be anything more beautiful this year,” gushed one of Vienna’s leading dailies – and it was probably right.
New Year’s Concert 1992
After this sensational, rousing concert, the most popular event of the year for the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, the entire Austrian media were unanimous: this was a one-of-a-kind sensation. Broadcast in 25 countries and reaching a potential viewership of a billion viewers and listeners, the concert carried the spirit of Vienna and its most popular son, Johann Strauss Jr., across the entire world. While the waltzes of Johann and Joseph Strauss (as well as an overture by Otto Nicolai) were certainly one reason for the concert’s enormous success, it could not have reached this level of peerlessness without Carlos Kleiber. Known rather as an introspective musician, Kleiber proved in the 1989 New Year’s Concert that he was a master of the light and bubbly as well. All of the works – from the Pizzicato Polka and the Tritsch-Tratsch Polka to the Blue Danube waltz and the Radetzky March – were played with such brilliance, virtuosity and overflowing good spirits that one Vienna daily titled the event “a miracle in 3/4 time.”