An incredible 89 curtain calls is testament to the ballet history that was written at the Vienna State Opera on October 15, 1964. The event is a performance of Swan Lake choreographed by Russian dancer Rudolf Nureyev, who also took on the male lead role of the Prince. His partner is the British prima ballerina Margot Fonteyn. In his novel interpretation of Swan Lake, Nureyev revolutionises the role of the male dancer, seeking to be her equal counterpart. This great moment in music includes theexcerpts of the legendary ballet recording, while the documentary passages with Nureyev reveal and make tangible this exceptional and fascinating personality. In newly filmed conversations, dancers and companions Michael Birkmeyer and Gisela Cech, who danced alongside Nureyev at the premiere of Swan Lake, share some personal memories of the iconic figure, while new protagonists of today’s ballet world look back at Nureyev and his work from the perspective of our times.
Magic Moments of Music – Rubinstein plays Chopin
In April of 1975, a piece of music history is filmed in London’s Fairfield Hall: the legendary pianist Arthur Rubinstein wants to leave a legacy to the world. 63 years after he made his debut there, 88 year old Rubinstein returns to London to record Chopin’s Second Piano Concerto, completely without an audience, especially for the cameras, with the London Symphony Orchestra under conductor André Previn. Chopin’s Second Piano Concerto has accompanied him throughout his life. Rubinstein dominated the world stage for three quarters of a century and lived life to the fullest as a connoisseur, globetrotter and notorious womaniser. Although he claimed to practice as little as possible, he would go on to become one of the most important pianists of the 20th century and described himself as “the happiest man I ever met in my life”.
The Unanswered Ives
The first film about the most famous “weekend composer”: Charles Ives. As a teenager, he composes dance melodies as well as church hymns, becoming the youngest organist of all Connecticut at age 14. As a natural talent in sports, he is appointed captain of the football team at the elite Yale University before the former music student becomes the most successful life insurer in the United States. Charles Ives (1874-1954) is perhaps the most famous “weekend composer” of musical history – and is regarded today as the first composer of the modern age in America. The Unanswered Ives is the first film about Charles Ives and a profound exploration of this extraordinary, multi-faceted personality. The documentary shed light on Ives’ life and work in all its facets and inconsistencies.
Music, War and Revolution – Silenced: Composers in Revolutionary Russia
When the First World War broke out in 1914, the musical world did not remain unaffected. Artists inevitably became involved, either as soldiers at the front or as composers of patriotic music or musical memorials to a lost world. The three-part documentary series investigates the (un)known, overt and hidden connections between music, war and revolution. The fates of young rebels such as Arthur Lourié, Nikolai Roslavets, Alexander Mosolov or Leon Theremin reveal much about the once hopeful and tragic entanglement with art and politics to which so many artists fell victim during the First World War, the October Revolution and the early Soviet Union’s cultural life. “Silenced”, the 2nd part rediscovers the long-banished and forgotten Russian composers of the early twentieth century who flirted with futurism, wrote the first twelve-tone chord of musical history or invented the first electronic musical instrument. “Silenced” sheds light upon their tragic stories and their exceptional music. Musicologists, composers, descendants, and musicians illuminate the composers’ fates from their perspective and establish both cultural references as well as the historical and political context.
Magic Moments of Music – Barenboim and WEDO in Ramallah
Music under extreme conditions: Only six years after its founding, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra gave what is probably its most legendary concert: the orchestra founded by Daniel Barenboim and Edward Said with young Israeli and Arab musicians gave a concert in the Darwish Palace of Culture in Ramallah in 2005. A historic event and a musical moment of glory at the same time. In Israel, Barenboim was attacked. But the orchestra set an example with its concert, underlined by the choice of programme: Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 (‘Fate Symphony’). Beethoven’s vision of the reconciliation of people – that was what moved Barenboim. The “peace concert” – Barenboim himself did not call it that – attracted international attention and was broadcast worldwide. This star hour shows the concert and makes musical history tangible in short documentary passages. Contemporary witnesses and prominent interview partners put the concert into perspective from today’s point of view.