Since taking up his post as principal conductor of the Dresden Staatskapelle in 2012, Christian Thielemann has launched each new concert season with a Bruckner symphony. In autumn 2015 he choose for the opening concert at Dresden’s historic Semperoper the Sixth, and for the Sächsische Zeitung this performance marked “another Bruckner triumph for Dresden”. Thielemann once more “conjured up the most magical of sonorities” and “the orchestra played magnificently under him“. (Der Neue Merker)
Beethoven Symphony No. 9
This Beethoven Symphony No. 9 from the outstanding Beethoven 9 Project of Christian Thielemann and the Wiener Philharmoniker, first time recorded in HD and 5.0 surround sound, is accompanied by a one hour-long documentary featuring Christian Thielemann and Germany´s most eminent music critic, Prof. Joachim Kaiser. From insights into Beethoven´s musical thinking to interpretational comparisons, including excerpts from performances by Karajan, Bernstein, Järvi, to historical perspectives – no aspect of Beethoven´s Symphony No. 9 will remain untreated!
Franz Schubert: Winterreise – visualized by William Kentridge
Franz Schubert´s “Winterreise” engages with its audience in a new and unexpected form: in a creative encounter with Schubert’s masterpiece. Matthias Goerne, ”the voice of perfection” (Le Figaro), pianist Markus Hinterhäuser and South African director, set designer and theatre artist William Kentridge joined forces on stage and traced newly imagined, deeply moving
images. In short animated films, Kentridge visualises Goerne’s and Hinterhäuser’s sonic contribution. A memorable meeting “of melancholy and magic.” (La Marseillaise). “Mr. Kentridge’s 24 stop-action films – made up of animated ink drawings and collages – offer a visually mesmerizing and thought-provoking commentary on Schubert’s song cycle.” (New York Times);
“There is an unusual robustness to his (Matthias Goerne´s) wanderer, infused by the virile beauty of his powerful baritone.” (New York Times)
Marc Minkowski at Mozartwoche
Under the direction of the principal conductor and artistic director of the Salzburg Mozart Week, Marc Minkowski, the Musiciens du Louvre perform on two of Mozart’s original instruments. Mozart’s Violin Concerto and his Piano Concerto in A major are played on instruments that were once in the composer’s possession. Thibault Noally plays the Violin Concerto on a violin from the workshop of Pietro Antonio Dalla Costa and “conjures up Romantic brilliance from the well maintained instrument”, then Francesco Corti brings Mozart’s fortepiano to life again, thereby spreading “collective Mozart happiness all round” (Salzburger Nachrichten).
András Schiff at Mozartwoche
Vienna – once the music hub of Europe – attracted all the greatest composers of its day, among them Beethoven, Schubert and Mozart. This concert with Sir András Schiff and the Capella Andrea Barca from the Salzburg Mozart Week brings together three works by these great composers, all created at the start of their impressive Viennese careers. About Beethoven’s First Piano Concerto the Salzburg press wrote admiringly: “Sensitively supported by the rich and supple tone of the strings, Schiff’s pianistic virtuosity explores the length and breadth of Beethoven’s early work, from the opulent to the playful, with a palpable delight rarely found in such measure in a pianist”, while in Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 22 “Schiff demonstrates his skill in pianistic interpretation and in conducting, nuanced, passionate, a sensitive revelation”.
Beethoven Piano Sonatas Vol. 2
Beethoven’s opus of 32 piano sonatas, known as “the New Testament of piano music”, is a landmark in piano literature. Spanning Beethoven’s entire life, the sonatas reflect his whole development as a human being and a musician, moving from one century into the next, from one epoch in music in to another. With the sonatas “Pathétique”, “Moonlight”, “Waldstein”, “Appassionata”, “Hammerklavier” and the final sonata op. 111, the cycle contains some of the most known piano pieces of all time. Now, for the first time in its history the complete cycle was performed at the Salzburg Festival. For this challenge the Festival asked no less than the world-renowned and influential Beethoven expert and pianist Rudolf Buchbinder. With more than 45 performances of Beethoven’s complete sonata cycle in concert halls all over the world and his relentless drive to discover new details and facets in the sonatas through meticulous study of the scores, “Buchbinder has set new standards in the interpretation of Beethoven’s works” (Bayerischer Rundfunk).
Beethoven Piano Sonatas Vol. 3
Beethoven’s opus of 32 piano sonatas, known as “the New Testament of piano music”, is a landmark in piano literature. Spanning Beethoven’s entire life, the sonatas reflect his whole development as a human being and a musician, moving from one century into the next, from one epoch in music in to another. With the sonatas “Pathétique”, “Moonlight”, “Waldstein”, “Appassionata”, “Hammerklavier” and the final sonata op. 111, the cycle contains some of the most known piano pieces of all time. Now, for the first time in its history the complete cycle was performed at the Salzburg Festival. For this challenge the Festival asked no less than the world-renowned and influential Beethoven expert and pianist Rudolf Buchbinder. With more than 45 performances of Beethoven’s complete sonata cycle in concert halls all over the world and his relentless drive to discover new details and facets in the sonatas through meticulous study of the scores, “Buchbinder has set new standards in the interpretation of Beethoven’s works” (Bayerischer Rundfunk).
Beethoven: The complete Piano Sonatas / Rudolf Buchbinder
Beethoven’s opus of 32 piano sonatas, known as “the New Testament of piano music”, is a landmark in piano literature. Spanning Beethoven’s entire life, the sonatas reflect his whole development as a human being and a musician, moving from one century into the next, from one epoch in music in to another. With the sonatas “Pathétique”, “Moonlight”, “Waldstein”, “Appassionata”, “Hammerklavier” and the final sonata op. 111, the cycle contains some of the most known piano pieces of all time. Now, for the first time in ist history the complete cycle was performed at the Salzburg Festival. For this challenge the Festival asked no less than the world-renowned and influential Beethoven expert and pianist Rudolf Buchbinder. With more than 45 performances of Beethoven’s complete sonata cycle in concert halls all over the world and his relentless drive to discover new details and facets in the sonatas through meticulous study of the scores, “Buchbinder has set new standards in the interpretation of Beethoven’s works” (Bayerischer Rundfunk). BONUS: 36 minutes interview with Rudolf Buchbinder about the Beethoven Piano Sonatas
The Brahms Symphonies
The Brahms interpretations of Paavo Järvi, the Grammy Award-winning Estonian-American conductor, and his Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen have been receiving the highest public and critical acclaim. “A Brahms revelation“ was the headline in the New Yorker, for the Zeit it’s „a reference recording“ and the Hamburger Abendblatt wrote “the greatest experts of Brahms come from Bremen (die besten Brahms Versteher kommen aus Bremen)“. The Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen perform Brahms nowadays exactly to the size that the composer himself was accustomed to at the time. This interpretation puts Brahms´ symphonies in a new light, which is explored in the additional documentary through the eyes of the musicians and their artistic director Paavo Järvi. BONUS: The Brahms Code – A music documentary by award-winning film director Christian Berger explores the four symphonies by Johannes Brahms through the eyes of the musicians and their artistic director Paavo Järvi.
Brahms: The Piano Concertos
“It is not every day that Brahms sounds so perfect as this,” enthuses the Kurier newspaper, describing Buchbinder’s performance with the Vienna Philharmonic. The “phenomenal piano virtuoso” (Kurier) plays the First and Second Piano Concertos of Johannes Brahms in the Golden Hall of the Vienna Musikverein with Maestro Zubin Mehta, who has long been intensively associated both with the orchestra and with soloist Rudolf Buchbinder. Brahms’s piano concertos constantly demand from the pianist a wide range of interpretational refinement alongside a very high level of concentration and considerable technical skill. A challenge which Rudolf Buchbinder easily achieves: “Buchbinder’s tour de force earned him cheers” (Die Presse). “What Rudolf Buchbinder, the Vienna Philharmonic and conductor Zubin Mehta delivered at the Musikverein easily deserves the accolade ‘milestone’.” (Kurier)