Live from the Rossini Festival in Pesaro: Alberto Zedda conducts Rossini’s late masterwork, with an excellent singers quartet and the Coro and Orchestra of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna.
Discovering Beethoven
For each symphony of the BEETHOVEN 9 project Christian Thielemann and Joachim Kaiser present an entertaining introduction feature with various examples and music excerpts plus documentary with Prof. Hellsberg on Beethoven and the Wiener Philharmoniker (A05512808 1×34’).
The Most Beautiful Operas of All Time
Reach out with ‘The Most Beautiful Operas of All Time’ format to a viewership beyond the typical classical music fans: Present the most beautiful operas of all time by combining the broadcast of the documentaries with the according opera productions in as many different stagings as you like. Let the viewers not only discover the rich world and full variety of opera music but also let them choose the ‘most beautiful opera of all time’ and create the classical music TV-event which is widely perceived in all media. Documentaries: AIDA, LA BOHÈME, CARMEN, DON GIOVANNI, FIDELIO, LOHENGRIN, DER ROSENKAVALIER, TOSCA, LA TRAVIATA, DIE ZAUBERFLÖTE
Recital Diana Damrau
One of the warmest personalities on the opera and concert stage today, soprano Diana Damrau has put together a beguiling program for her recital at the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden. The selection of Romantic to fin-de-siècle pieces not only underscores her own vocal artistry, but also pays tribute to her accompanist Xavier de Maistre and, in particular, to the diaphanous delicacy of his instrument, the harp. The use of the harp to replace the piano in a voice recital is a truly unique and unexpected musical treat. De Maistre does more than simply transpose the piano part to his instrument; under the fingers of the Wiener Philharmoniker’s solo harpist, the ethereal sound of this instrument melds consummately with the soprano’s finely honed vocal part, so that the masterpieces by composers such as Schumann, Fauré and Debussy sound as if they had been conceived for voice and harp.
Beethoven Cycle Kammerphilharmonie Bremen
In 2006, conductor and Grammy Award-winner Paavo Järvi and the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen set off on a major adventure: to master all nine Beethoven symphonies in a radical new reading. Järvi’s sensational new approach to these familiar works has won great renown for the orchestra. Their success led to a worldwide tour which included the U.S. and Japan (where the ensemble was ranked among the world’s top ten orchestras), and such prestigious venues as the Salzburg Festival. Wherever they performed, they were acclaimed by the press, who called them ‘the authoritative Beethoven orchestra of our day’. Many consider the Beethoven cycle as ‘without a doubt the best Beethoven in the world’ (Yomiuri Shimbun).
The Promise of Music – Beethovenfest Bonn
The concert given by the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela under its conductor Gustavo Dudamel at the Beethovenfest 2007 in Bonn was a highlight of the musical year. Over 200 young musicians between the ages of 10 and 24, many from underprivileged backgrounds, performed with nearly untamable energy under the baton of a young maestro destined to conduct the most fabled orchestras in the world. The concert program (2 x 45’) includes Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony, Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances, and pieces by Latin American composers Revueltas, Márquez and Ginastera. In the riveting 90-minute documentary ‘The Promise of Music’ (Prog. No. A05016554) directed by Enrique Sánchez Lansch (award-winning ‘Rhythm Is It’), we follow Dudamel as he prepares his orchestra in Caracas for its concert in Bonn, and we accompany the young musicians on their trip to Europe.
Julia Fischer – Violin and Piano
In her January 2008 concert with the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie under Matthias Pintscher, Julia Fischer, named ‘Artist of the Year’ in 2007 by the U.K.’s ‘Gramophone’ magazine, did exactly as Bach and Mozart did: she appeared in public as a soloist on two completely different instruments, the violin and the piano. Fischer, who also trained as a pianist, pulled off this rare and risky feat with extraordinary prowess. In Saint-Saëns’ Violin Concerto No. 3 in B minor op. 61, she weaves her lines seamlessly into the orchestral texture, emerging now with prominent embellishments, now with passionate cantilenas, or withdrawing to let the woodwinds express themselves as equals. For her ‘piano’ part of the evening, Julia Fischer chose the popular Grieg Concerto in A minor op. 16, a warhorse that shares with the previous work an intricate interweaving of the solo and orchestral parts. Commenting on her flawless piano technique and utterly natural artistry on this instrument, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung wrote: ‘She mastered the work with bravura … a more than amazing double talent.’
Opera Gala Baden-Baden
Four of the greatest singers of our time combine their talents and their artistry in an evening of beloved operatic numbers – rarely has a concert deserved the title ‘Opera Summit’ as much as this one, recorded live at the Festspielhaus in Baden-Baden on 3 August 2007. Heading the quartet is soprano Anna Netrebko with her inimitable blend of glamour and simplicity, her enticing appearance and seductive singing, a musical powerhouse who tops the pop charts and sells out operas houses within hours. Hardly less dazzling than her Russian colleague is Latvian mezzo Elina Garanc?a, whose crystal-clear voice and charismatic stage presence never fail to enthrall her audiences. Replacing the indisposed Rolando Villazón is his fellow Mexican tenor Ramón Vargas, who began his career in Europe after winning the first prize in the Enrico Caruso Competition in Milan. French baritone Ludovic Tézier is a frequent guest at La Scala, the Opéra Bastille and the Met.
Classical Summit 2006 – Three Superstars in Berlin
In the tradition of the original ‘The Three Tenors,’ world-class singers Plácido Domingo, Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazón joined forces to entertain a live audience of 20,000 spectators on location and millions more around the world on TV. They sing the most famous arias and duets from the world of opera, accompanied by the orchestra of the Deutsche Oper Berlin and its conductor Marco Armiliato.
Anne-Sophie Mutter plays Mozart: Sonatas for Violin and Piano
An important part of Anne-Sophie Mutter‘s ‘Mozart Project’ is to present the composer‘s mature violin sonatas. Between 2005 and 2007, Anne- Sophie Mutter and pianist Lambert Orkis toured throughout Europe, North America and Asia with the Mozart sonatas. In major musical centers such as Paris, London, Vienna and New York, they offered the entire cycle over three consecutive evenings. This three-evening survey was recorded in Munich in February 2006. The last sonatas were written by Mozart between 1784 and 1788 and include Ms. Mutter‘s favorite, the B flat major Sonata K. 454, ‘a monumental achievement,’ as she puts it.
Also available:
‘The Making of The Mozart Project’ (45’), in which Anne-Sophie Mutter
talks about her relationship to Mozart’s music.