Alban Berg’s opera ‘Lulu’ is the story of a lower-class girl who sleeps her way to fame and fortune before losing everything she has and finding death at the hands of Jack the Ripper. Conductor Marc Albrecht supports the two main protagonists, Patricia Petibon’s Lulu and Michael Volle’s Dr. Schön, with the rich sonorities of Berg’s music. Particularly impressive are the gigantic backdrops that dominate the stage and were painted by Daniel Richter, one of the leading German artists of our time.
Mozart: Don Giovanni
Filmed at the 1954 Salzburg Festival, this restored and technically enhanced recording of “Don Giovanni” is more than simply a superb performance of one of the world’s most lastingly popular operas with an exquisite cast led by Cesare Siepi, Elisabeth Grümmer and Lisa della Casa. It is the last visual document of Wilhelm Furtwängler’s art, the legacy of a great conductor. A giant among 20th-century conductors, Wilhelm Furtwängler was associated for many years with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. After the war, he discovered a new, exceptionally rewarding venue for his artistry at the Salzburg Festival. Beginning with “Fidelio” in 1948, Furtwängler ushered in a golden age of memorable performances in Salzburg.
Lang Lang & Nikolaus Harnoncourt: Mission Mozart
In spring 2014 the Vienna Musikverein turned into a music laboratory, a recording studio and into a venue for a very exciting enounter of two seemingly very different artists: Nikolaus Harnoncourt, well-known as an intellectual musician who came to attention as a period-practice and Lang Lang, a superstar, a pianist of stunning virtuosity and freewheeling music instincts, together with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra record the Mozart Piano Concertos No. 17 K453 in G major and No. 24 K491 in C minor. This documentary is a revealing insight into the creative process of two of the most distinctive and influential musicians in the world today.
Karajan conducts Tchaikovsky 4
Tchaikovsky described his Fourth Symphony in a letter to Nadezhda von Meck as “perhaps the best I have written so far”. With allusions to Beethoven’s Fifth and an obsessive exploration of the idea of destiny (introduced the imposing initial fanfare), the symphony took shape at toward the beginning of Tchaikovsky’s platonic relationship with Nadezhda von Meck, the wealthy widow who became the composer’s patron, and to whom the work is dedicated. The Symphony’s premiere on February 10, 1878 in Moscow under the baton of Nikolai Rubenstein was met with a lukewarm audience reception, yet despite this difficult start, the work was performed a month later in St. Petersburg to an adoring public who demanded an encore! Herbert von Karajan and the Wiener Philharmoniker perform the work with all the energy, rigor, and subtlety for which they were celebrated.
Karajan conducts Tchaikovsky 5
Herbert von Karajan leads the Wiener Philharmoniker in Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony at Vienna’s Musikverein in this exceptional archival video footage. Premiered in 1888 with the conductor himself at the baton, the Symphony No. 5 proved popular with audiences while being heavily criticized by the press, hurting the composer emotionally. The work develops a single theme over the course of four movements in a similar fashion to the “Manfred” Symphony, written a few years previously. Beyond the work’s obvious beauty, the demanding and nuanced interpretation of Karajan allows us to appreciate its particular structural details as well.
Karajan conducts Tchaikovsky 6 “Pathetique”
Premiered in 1893 in St. Petersburg with Tchaikovsky on the podium, the Sixth Symphony—later nicknamed “Pathetique”—was met with lukewarm reception before achieving success a few months later under the baton of Napravnik, barely 9 days before the death of the composer! Dedicated to his nephew, Tchaikovsky explained that he had “put my whole soul into this work”, and a tragic aura has remained associated with his ultimate symphonic composition. Discover this powerful work in an exceptional performance with maestro Karajan at the head of the Wiener Philharmoniker.
Messa da Requiem
Herbert von Karajan recorded Verdi’s Requiem multiple times over the course of his career, such that it became one of the signature works of his repertoire. In this film, he brings together an exceptional group of some of the late 20th century’s greatest singers: Anna Tomowa-Sintow, Agnès Baltsa, José Carreras, and José van Dam. Composed between Aida and Otello, the Messa da Requiem is dedicated to his friend, the poet Alessandro Manzoni, who had participated in the Italian unification movement, the Risorgimento. The technically and artistically challenging work was described by Verdi’s contemporary, the conductor Hans von Bülow, as an “opera in ecclesiastical garb”, an interesting expression of the fascinating tension between the theatrical and the religious in this monumental chef-d’oeuvre.
Coronation Mass & Ave Verum Corpus
Saturday, June 29, 1985: Herbert von Karajan and the Wiener Philharmoniker perform Mozart’s Coronation Mass with four of the greatest singers of the decade as part of a mass celebrated by Pope Jean Paul II at the St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Ten thousand cardinals, bishops, diplomats from the world over, Italian political figures, and important personalities from the cultural scene are present. Two years earlier in during the pope’s visit to Austria, it was Karajan himself who suggested performing Mozart’s work in a religious service to the great religious leader.
Mozart Requiem
Experience Mozart’s Requiem, founding work of the Western classical music canon, in one of the best performances ever captured on film featuring Herbert von Karajan, the Wiener Philharmoniker, and four brilliant soloists. Today, the Requiem is without a doubt one of Mozart’s most performed and beloved works, but its origins remain mysterious and its score left unfinished by the genius creator who prematurely died during its composition at the age of 35.
New Year’s Concert – Neujahrskonzert 1987
In 1987, Herbert von Karajan was chosen to conduct Vienna’s prestigious New Year’s concert, an iconic annual event that became particularly patriotic that evening when an Austrian conductor led the Wiener Philharmoniker in an all-Viennese concert program! Waltzes, polkas, and Strauss’s unforgettable Radetzky March shared a program with a scintillating vocal waltz called Springtime Voices sung by the masterful Kathleen Battle—the only vocal soloist ever invited in the history of the New Year’s Concert!