Solti’s professional advancement starts at a time when Germany was on its knees. The film depicts this situation by including historical video documents. Only a couple of hours before his death on 5th September 1997, he made his last corrections for the book. By using a narrator who reads excerpts of his biography, Solti is virtually given a voice in this film. The interview partners add an important dimension to the film. All of them were very well acquainted with Solti and have fascinating stories to tell. In regards to capturing performances, Solti was as productive as Bernstein and Karajan. The archives of the ARD network list about 120 TV productions, interviews, rehearsals. Further rich sources are the archives of BR, HR, SWR, ORF, Unitel and the BBC.
On the Road – On the Trail of Jack Kerouac
In 1951- 60 years ago – Jack Kerouac wrote ‘On The Road’. The novel tells the story of Jack Kerouac’s travels across the America of the late forties, always searching for freedom, for himself, for drugs, sex and the next great adventure. ‘On The Road’ lies at the core of pop culture. This book is the key to everything that followed. We want the 60th anniversary of its orginal publication to be the moment we take a closer look at it, as well: Four young people got the opportunity to get into an old convertible and drive that car straight across America on Jack Kerouac’s route. How will these modern young people experience a trip through modern America with ‘On The Road’ shining in the background? The result: a road movie, a collage of original locations, poetry slams, cinema verite, jam sessions, and new adventures on the road, with music by Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel, Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Gotye, Scott McKenzie, REM, Morcheeba, Eric Clapton, Fleetwood Mac, John Coltrane and Don McLean, amongst others.
The Heart of Sound – A Musical Journey with Vittorio Ghielmi
The Island of Sardinia is very rich in traditional song, music and dance of all kinds, and supports two distinct forms of polyvocal singing. The first is the secular sung dance-music Cantu á Tenores tradition, the second is the Coro or Cuncordu tradition of sacred ritual music, which in the quite recent past they were an integral part of numerous socio/religious rituals. World-renowned Viola da Gamba player, conductor and composer Vittorio Ghielmi (who appears with orchestras such as Il Giardino Armonico, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra or the London Philharmonic Orchestra) has been on a lifelong quest to find and create authentic interpretations of ancient-classical music.The film documents a special and unique way of making music that contributes to the vitality of rural life and thus provides a closer picture at Sardinia off the beaten tourist tracks. The sound track as well follows untrodden paths: the fruits of this collaboration reward the audience with music never ever played before.
Stravinsky in Hollywood
Stravinsky in Hollywood explores the short-lived film career of this legendary composer, it is the story of his trials and tribulations with the Hollywood Studios, the story of an ‘old school’ European artist knocking heads with the brash New World. Igor Stravinsky lived in the heart of Hollywood from 1939 until shortly before his death in 1971 – longer than in any other single place. He came expecting to find lucrative work composing for the movies. The 60-minute film uses a combination of existing archival footage (some of it never before seen), contemporary interviews with experts in the field and living movie composers, and scenes from several big studio films of the 40s brought together – for the first time – with the music which Stravinsky wrote for them.
The Queens of Pop
ARTE viewers voted for the ‘Queens of Pop’. 8 pop queens were chosen from 50 proposals and these are presented in a 26-minute documentary: From the 1960s: Diana Ross. From the 1970s: Donna Summer and Debbie Harry. From the 1980s: Madonna. From the 1990s: Britney Spears and Mariah Carey. From 2000-2009: Lady Gaga and Beyoncé. The title of the programme, ‘Queens of Pop’, in itself shows where the emphasis lies – none of those simplistic chart rankings, but instead a documentary series that looks at our cultural history, dealing with the women who shaped popular music over the past fifty years.
Vadim Repin – a Magician of Sound
Born in Siberia in 1971, Vadim Repin started to play violin at the age of five and had his first stage performance six months later. At only eleven he won the gold medal in all age categories in the Wienawski Competition and gave his recital debuts in Moscow and St Petersburg. In 1985 at fourteen he made his debuts in Tokyo, Munich, Berlin, Helsinki; a year later in Carnegie Hall. Two years later Vadim Repin was the youngest ever winner of the most prestigious and demanding violin competition in the world, the Reine Elisabeth Concours. From the vastness of Siberia to world fame, the violin virtuoso Vadim Repin returns to where his career began, for a Brahms tour, far away from the cultural centre of Moscow. From Irkutsk at Lake Baikal to Novosibirsk, we follow the magnificent artist to the West, where Yehudi Menuhin once called him the ‘most perfect violinist in the world’ he ever heard.
London Calling
London Calling tells the untold story of British pop through the prism of related artforms, revealing how photographic imagery defined the medium, the phenomenal influence of art schools and fashion, the scene’s love/hate affair with cinema and the pivotal role of the starmakers and svengalis who invented the rules of the modern music industry as they went along. London Calling cracks the creative code underpinning the irresistible rise of British pop. The 4-part series from award-winning music TV veterans Hannes Rossacher and Simon Witter. Episode 1: Fuck Art Let’s Dance – Episode 2: Every Picture Tells A Story – Episode 3: You Wear It Well – Episode 4: Master Of Puppets.
Carlos Kleiber – I Am Lost To The World
Carlos Kleiber, the eccentric and reclusive conductor was a fabled perfectionist who was known as much for the rarity of his appearances as for the brilliance of his interpretations. Georg Wübbolt’s film sheds light on the relationships with his family, including his father and mother, traces the development of Kleiber’s career and covers the ‘mythologizing’ that started during the lifetime of the maestro.
Komeda – A Soundtrack for A Life
Krzysztof Komeda – Jazz pianist and film composer. With compositions like the lullaby for “Rosemary´s Baby” from Roman Polanski, Komeda succeeded in writing his own chapter in the history of soundtracks. As a Jazz musician he gained cult-status in Poland. As a film composer he made it into Hollywood’s first ranks. But there his career came to a sudden end. The film essay „KOMEDA – A SOUNDTRACK FOR A LIFE“ is a reflection on Komeda’s soundtracks, which changed the common film scores forever. It is a contemporary document about the attitude to life in a time of social, political and cultural change after war, about work and exodus of Polish artist in the 50s and 60s. Directors who worked with Komeda and who are also friends will talk about him: Roman Polanski, Jerzy Skolimowski, Henning Carlsen and Andrzej Wajda. His wife, Zofia Komeda, and his sister, Irena Orlowska, remember him.
Inside The Infernal Comedy
John Leake, who spent 3 years researching the Unterweger case in minute detail (‘entering Hades’), in conversation with Michael Sturminger
the author and director of the Infernal Comedy. Martin Haselböck, the conductor of the Vienna Academy Orchestra, illuminates the beginnings and musical conception of this utterly new form with classical 18th century arias and the fate of a 20th century serial killer to create a profound evening of musical theatre. The truth and nothing
but the truth.