Mozart’s Gran Partita – the Serenade No. 10 in B flat K361 – is scored for twelve wind instruments (two oboes, two clarinets, two basset horns, four horns, two bassoons) and a double bass. The seven-part work is performed by woodwind players of the Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century, specialists in authentic performances of the music of Mozart’s era.
La cathédrale engloutie
Jiri Kylián’s ballet is set to a composition by Claude Debussy which was inspired by a fifteenth-century Breton legend. This tells how a cathedral was built on a seashore as a symbol to the Almighty that he would reign over the people. But they led godless lives and, as a result, the cathedral disappeared below the waves. This performance was recorded in studio.
The Raphael Quartet plays Beethoven
The acclaimed Dutch string quartet plays two works by Beethoven: The Cavatina movement of String Quartet No. 13 in B flat major Op. 130 and String Quartet in B flat major Op. 133 (Grosse Fuge).
Symphony No. 4 in G Major
Recorded live from the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, Haitink conducts the Concertgebouw Orchestra in a performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 in G major. Maria Ewing sings the soprano solo in the work’s finale.
Symphony No. 3 in D minor
In this live concert recording from the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, Haitink conducts the NOS Women’s Choir, the North Holland Boys’ Choir and the Concertgebouw Orchestra in a performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 in D minor, with soloist Carolyn Watkinson (contralto).
Franz Liszt
The Hungarian piano virtuoso Liszt (1811-86) led an illustrious life between Paris, his base as a performer, Weimar, where he was court musical director, composer and champion of new music, and Rome, where he took minor holy orders, entitling him to be called Abbé. Focusing on the end of his life and his last compositions, in particular La Lugubre Gondola, this film shows that he was not just one of the last great Romantics, but that his final compositions range harmonically far into the future.
Piano Variations
Three ballets by Hans van Manen reflect his choreographic preoccupation with relationships between the sexes. Piano Variations II, to Prokofiev’s Sarcasms Op. 17, shows a couple locked in a cycle of acceptance and rejection. In Piano Variation III, to Satie’s Trois Gnossiennes, a man and a woman succumb to a growing attraction. Piano Variation IV, to Etudes by Debussy, shows a man resisting twelve women, before yielding. This studio recording includes an interview with van Manen.
The Hague School
The Dutch painters of The Hague School took the innovative step of leaving their Studios to paint nature in situ. The 1870s and ’80s saw the heyday of the movement, when artists, including Anton Mauve, Jacob Israels, Jacob Marais and Hendrik Mesdag, fled to The Hague to escape the increasing ugliness of urbanisation and to capture in their paintings the beauty of the countryside. This programme explores their work and shows the unique landscape which inspired them.
Symphony in D
In his ballet Symphony in D Jirí Kylián demonstrates a remarkable ability to create a highly inventive and graceful ballet, which is, at the same time, extremely funny. Set to Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No. 101 in D (Clock) and Symphony No. 73 (The Chase), it is an affectionate send-up of classical ballet poses, and is performed with great wit and style by the Nederlands Dans Theater in this live recording.