Christian Thielemann’s brilliant interpretation of Bruckner’s Symphony No. 2 is superbly performed by the Staatskapelle Dresden and concludes its critically acclaimed Bruckner Cycle with a concert at the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg. The orchestra makes skilled use of the new hall’s clear acoustics, filling the space with its warm sound: simply phenomenal! A concert that “will go down in the annals of the Elbphilharmonie” (Die Welt).
Grafenegg: Midsummer Night’s Gala 2016
For the Summer Nights Gala world stars assemble under the night sky on Grafenegg’s “Wolkenturm” (“cloud-tower”) stage, the futuristic stage design that has become a symbol of the Festival. Bass-baritone Bryn Terfel and soprano Olga Peretyatko present works by Gounod, Bizet, Verdi, Donizetti and Lehár, pianist Rudolf Buchbinder plays Weber’s Concert Piece in F minor. The gala conclude with a firework display to Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance in front of the beautiful backdrop of the idyllic castle grounds. “A triumph for Peretyatko, Terfel and Buchbinder!” (Kronenzeitung) “A feast of great voices and uppermost piano-art.” (Kurier)
Grafenegg: Anniversary Gala 2016: Beethoven No. 9
The Grafenegg Festival celebrates its 10 years’ anniversary! On this occasion, the Tonkünstler Orchestra, under the baton of Yutaka Sado, is joined by 22 alumni of the European Union Youth Orchestra and accompanied by top soloists Klaus Florian Vogt, René Pape, Camilla Nylund and Elena Zhidkova. The jubilee includes this year’s Composer in Residence Christian Jost’s two commissioned works Fanfare and An die Hoffnung as well as Beethoven’s Overture Coriolan. With Beethoven’s 9th Symphony the evening reaches ist climax. Due to the performance of “the excellent bass René Pape, the fabulous soprano Camilla Nylund and the great mezzo-soprano Elena Zhidkova along with the Wiener Singverein, Beethoven’s 9th Symphony turned out to be simply sensational. Jubilation!” (Kurier)
Red Ribbon Celebration Concert 2016 – Orpheus and Eurydice
On the occasion of the Red Ribbon Celebration Concert, Vienna’s famous charity concert for the benefit of HIV and AIDS aid projects, some of the world’s greatest opera stars made their appearance at the venerable Burgtheater. Anna Netrebko, Piotr Bezcala, Juan Diego Flórez and Thomas Hampson took part in this festive concert evening which revolved around the legend of Orpheus and Eurydice. With excerpts from corresponding operas by Claudio Monteverdi and Christoph Willibald Gluck, works by W. A. Mozart and Franz Liszt, the audience is taken on Orpheus’ journey to the underworld, from where he desperately tries to take his love Eurydice back to the world of the living by the help of his singing.
Salzburg Festival: Dudamel conducts Strauss
Richard Strauss year 2014 at Salzburg Festival: Gustavo Dudamel, winner of the Leonard Bernstein Award 2014, conducts the Vienna Philharmonic. On the program Strauss’ tone poems “Tod & Verklärung” and “Also sprach Zarathustra”. The evening is rounded up with a work by René Staar, who is also one of the Philharmonic’s violinists.
Looking for Beethoven – On the Paths of the Beethoven String Quartets
What seems to be the predominant impulse driving this music,” explains viola player Krzysztof Chorzelski of the Belcea Quartet, “is man’s yearning for freedom, the unquenchable desire to expand his limits and to learn the truth about himself in this process Beethoven inspires us as performers to take up this challenge.” The Belcea Quartet’s response to this challenge took place in the Vienna Konzerthaus. The ensemble embarked on the complete cycle of Beethoven string quartets, playing the whole program within twelve days, each concert featuring one work from the early, middle and late quartets.
Making of “Die Jahreszeiten”
“Jubilation!” (Kronen Zeitung) in the Great Festival Hall in Salzburg for Joseph Haydn’s oratorio The Seasons with Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducting the Vienna Philharmonic. The conductor tunes his “Wiener” to peak performance and shows as few others can how “to coax the tenderest expressive pianissimo shiver from the violins and violas into the almost inaudible”, enthuses the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
Christian Thielemann rehearses “Die Frau ohne Schatten”
BEETHOVEN 9 – Making van Beethoven
A one-of-a-kind musical event is in the making! Christian Thielemann, one of the most recognized conductors of our time, joins forces with the prestigious Wiener Philharmoniker and UNITEL, the world’s leading audiovisual production company for classical music, in a monumental project: BEETHOVEN 9, the recording of all nine symphonies by Ludwig van Beethoven for TV, DVD and New Media: the “Beethoven cycle of the 21st century”! Using the newest technology of our century, UNITEL and Austrian Television (ORF) produce this “super-cycle” in the Golden Hall of Vienna’s Musikverein in HD and 5.0 Surround Sound. BEETHOVEN 9 kicked off in December 2008 with the recording of the First and Second Symphonies. At the rate of two recordings per year, the cycle will be completed by April 2010. The genesis and unfolding of this project will be accompanied by a documentary filmed in HD. Between 2010 and 2013 the orchestra will crown the venture with special event performances of the complete cycle in major cities around the world. These concert cycles will rank among the musical highlights of these years. They will be accompanied by the recordings, which will be released prior to the start of the world tour, when international attention is at its peak. Music lovers can enjoy Beethoven’s symphonies either live in the host cities or on television, Internet or DVD. Live transmission from the Golden Hall is possible already during the recording stage. BEETHOVEN 9 brings to a new climax the longstanding collaboration between Thielemann, who enjoys a sterling reputation as an interpreter of Beethoven and the German Romantics, and the Wiener Philharmoniker, which has been cultivating the music of Beethoven since its founding nearly 170 years ago and is one of the few great orchestras to have preserved its unique sound. UNITEL CLASSICA can look back on more than 40 years of collaboration with the Wiener Philharmoniker and on its pioneering cycles of Beethoven’s symphonic works with Herbert von Karajan and Leonard Bernstein.