This three-part documentary accompanies outstanding artist Daniel Barenboim on his quest into the social meaning of music and the secrets of sound. Part 1: Music and Politics (55′ min) // Part 2: Musical Approaches (28′ min) // Part 3: Part 3 Music and Taboo (28′ min / UPCOMING 58′ min).
‘Fiesta del Tango’ from Buenos Aires
The most renowned stars of the Argentinean tango scene performing in the famous ballroom ‘El Palacio’ in Buenos Aires, where tango legend Carlos Gardel accomplished his greatest successes in the twenties and thirties of the last century. The tango show features ‘Otros Aires’, ‘Café de los Maestros’, former lead singer of the Astor Piazzolla Band, Teresa Parodi, and Rodolfo Mederos. The artists are accompanied with the finest dancing stars such as ‘Eduardo y Gloria’.
Sound of the Sidewalks
You can find them standing in walkways, in front of bars or in the Paris metro, playing rock music, classical, Latin American or Caribbean rhythms on the world’s largest public stage: the street. This series is dedicated to street musicians in Europe ‘on the road’ with artists of life, dropouts, and virtuosos. Some of the résumés that can be discovered here are incredible, touching, and yet written by life. Whether getting up in the morning in Paris in search of a suitable location for the next performance, in dispute with the local authorities in Cologne or on nightly strolls through the lonely streets of Amsterdam, the camera is always there, allowing the audience to participate in the lives of these artists of life.
Wagner in Switzerland
This concert is a celebration of Richard Wagner’s 200th anniversary in 2013, featuring famous soloists of the Lucerne Festival Orchestra who perform Wagner’s Siegfried Idyll at his home in Tribschen, Switzerland: The original place, where he composed and world premiered the piece on the staircase in 1870 as a birthday present to his wife Cosima. The program is rounded by the Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder in the original version for female voice and piano, performed by the exceptional mezzo-soprano Elisabeth Kulman and pianist Eduard Kutrowat on Wagner’s original grand piano. The performance-part is complemented by documentary features offering an insight into Richard Wagner’s life at Tribschen.
Liszt Celebration Concert
For the very first time Daniel Barenboim tackled Franz Liszt’s two highly virtuosic piano concertos in a single concert. With Pierre Boulez, his friend and esteemed colleague of many years, conducting Barenboim’s own orchestra, the Staatskapelle Berlin, they were showered with praise on their tour across Europe. For both musicians, Liszt was one of the most important pioneers of modern music, as composer, conductor and pianist. He influenced revolutionary contemporaries such as Robert Schumann and Richard Wagner. Two examples of the latter’s magnificent orchestral work round off this concert programme celebrating Liszt’s bicentenary.
Isang Yun in North and South Korea
This documentary, filmed in North and South Korea, explores whether music can overcome the boundaries of a divided country. There is one figure of the two Koreas, whose outstanding biography in itself forms a bridge between both worlds: The Korean composer Isang Yun, one of the very few people acknowledged on both sides. The film traces the course of a life that has been interpreted in different ways, examining the worlds of North and South Korean music and in this way taking the viewer on an exciting journey through two political systems that Isang Yun spent his life trying to reconcile.
Angela Hewitt plays the Goldberg Variations
Since she was young, the Canadian pianist Angela Hewitt dedicated herself to the oeuvre of Johann Sebastian Bach with great passion and conviction. She has recorded all of his piano pieces on CD and performed them to audiences around the world in countless concerts. For her merits for this great composer, Hewitt is the first ever female recipient of the renowned Leipzig Bach Medal. On this occasion, she played Bach’s Goldberg Variations at St. Thomas Church in Leipzig, at the authentic place where Bach served as Thomas Cantor and is buried.
The Book of Madrigals
In their new Book of Madrigals, the a capella ensemble amarcord presents outstanding compositions from the European Renaissance by Dowland, Banchieri, Monteverdi, Palestrina, Josquin and Willaert. Along with Michael Metzler (percussion), Hille Perl (viol) and the American lutenist Lee Santana, the ensemble met in the fall of 2013 in the Venetia region of northern Italy. In the unique setting of the Villa Caldogno, built by the Italian Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio, the madrigals were recorded under studio conditions with several cameras. The program is available in three different formats: 78 or 44 minutes with interviews about the Renaissance period, the repertoire and the location. 58 minutes without interviews (music only).