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.’
Bruckner, Symphony No.7
“Grandiose, unaffected, expansive, majestic, immovable…” – Christian Thielemann’s description of Anton Bruckner’s music vividly captures its essence and uniqueness. And he himself captures the soul of the great romantic composer in his interpretation of Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony with the Munich Philharmonic. Recorded live at the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden on 14 November 2006, the concert also features three orchestral preludes from the opera “Palestrina” by another late-romantic composer, Hans Pfitzner (A05512085 / Length: 25′)
Pfitzner, Three Preludes to “Palestrina”
“Grandiose, unaffected, expansive, majestic, immovable…” – Christian Thielemann’s description of Anton Bruckner’s music vividly captures its essence and uniqueness. And he himself captures the soul of the great romantic composer in his interpretation of Bruckner’s Seventh Symphony with the Munich Philharmonic. Recorded live at the Festspielhaus Baden- Baden on 14 November 2006, the concert also features three orchestral preludes from the opera “Palestrina” by another late-romantic composer, Hans Pfitzner. The preludes from Pfitzner’s “Palestrina”, the composer’s most well-known work, evoke the events about to transpire in the acts that follow them. While the subtle, refined nuances of the first prelude suggests the creative crisis of the opera’s hero, the Renaissance composer Palestrina, the second reflects the turbulent atmosphere of the Council of Trent and the third the inner peace found at long last by Palestrina beneath the cupola of St. Peter’s. Completed in September 1883, several months after the death of Richard Wagner, Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 7 in E major is a stunning homage to the composer of the “Ring”. A passionate admirer of Wagner, Bruckner claimed that he had the master’s death in mind while writing the Adagio of this symphony. With its particularly soaring and melodious themes, the Seventh is Bruckner’s most popular and accessible symphony. It would be difficult to find a better team to interpret Bruckner’s music today than Christian Thielemann and the Munich Philharmonic. Thielemann, the General Music Director of the Munich ensemble, is a universally recognized Bruckner and Wagner expert, who inaugurated his tenure at the head of the Philharmonic by conducting Bruckner’s Fifth. The Munich orchestra has a long-standing tradition of performing Bruckner’s music and boasts a particular attachment to the Seventh: it was the second orchestra to play the work, and the success it obtained with it in 1885 helped establish Bruckner as a major contemporary composer. Thielemann also led the Munich Philharmonic and the Regensburg Boys’ Choir in the first concert given in honor of Pope Benedict XVI in Vatican City in October 2005, which was also recorded by Unitel/Classica.
Bruckner, Symphony No.8 in C minor (Kent Nagano Conducts Classical Masterpieces)
Six great composers, six landmark symphonies, a top orchestra and its star conductor Kent Nagano – these are the components of an extraordinary classical-music television event. Shot in High Definition, it takes a bold and innovative approach to the recording of classical music. Boom and tracking shots, quick cuts, remote-controlled cameras – stylistic means previously used chiefly for pop music recordings give the programs an up-to-the-minute look and feel. A team of more than 30 specialists makes sure that viewers enjoy a truly cinematic experience.
Mozart, Symphony No.41 in C major, K.551 “Jupiter” (Kent Nagano Conducts Classical Masterpieces)
Six great composers, six landmark symphonies, a top orchestra and its star conductor Kent Nagano – these are the components of an extraordinary classical-music television event. Shot in High Definition, it takes a bold and innovative approach to the recording of classical music. Boom and tracking shots, quick cuts, remote-controlled cameras – stylistic means previously used chiefly for pop music recordings give the programs an up-to-the-minute look and feel. A team of more than 30 specialists makes sure that viewers enjoy a truly cinematic experience.
Beethoven, Symphony No.3 in E flat major, op.55 “Eroica” (Kent Nagano Conducts Classical Masterpieces)
Six great composers, six landmark symphonies, a top orchestra and its star conductor Kent Nagano – these are the components of an extraordinary classical-music television event. Shot in High Definition, it takes a bold and innovative approach to the recording of classical music. Boom and tracking shots, quick cuts, remote-controlled cameras – stylistic means previously used chiefly for pop music recordings give the programs an up-to-the-minute look and feel. A team of more than 30 specialists makes sure that viewers enjoy a truly cinematic experience.
Strauss, Alpensymphonie (An Alpine Symphony) op.64 (Kent Nagano Conducts Classical Masterpieces)
Six great composers, six landmark symphonies, a top orchestra and its star conductor Kent Nagano – these are the components of an extraordinary classical-music television event. Shot in High Definition, it takes a bold and innovative approach to the recording of classical music. Boom and tracking shots, quick cuts, remote-controlled cameras – stylistic means previously used chiefly for pop music recordings give the programs an up-to-the-minute look and feel. A team of more than 30 specialists makes sure that viewers enjoy a truly cinematic experience.
Schumann, Symphony No.3 in E flat major, op.97 (Kent Nagano Conducts Classical Masterpieces)
Six great composers, six landmark symphonies, a top orchestra and its star conductor Kent Nagano – these are the components of an extraordinary classical-music television event. Shot in High Definition, it takes a bold and innovative approach to the recording of classical music. Boom and tracking shots, quick cuts, remote-controlled cameras – stylistic means previously used chiefly for pop music recordings give the programs an up-to-the-minute look and feel. A team of more than 30 specialists makes sure that viewers enjoy a truly cinematic experience.
Brahms, Symphony No.4 in E minor, op.98 (Kent Nagano Conducts Classical Masterpieces)
Six great composers, six landmark symphonies, a top orchestra and its star conductor Kent Nagano – these are the components of an extraordinary classical-music television event. Shot in High Definition, it takes a bold and innovative approach to the recording of classical music. Boom and tracking shots, quick cuts, remote-controlled cameras – stylistic means previously used chiefly for pop music recordings give the programs an up-to-the-minute look and feel. A team of more than 30 specialists makes sure that viewers enjoy a truly cinematic experience.