This four-part program sets out to “search for Beethoven” in the interpretation of his orchestral works. Each episode explores one specific work as it is understood by great conductors and musicians of our day. Sir Georg Solti, Riccardo Muti, Lorin Maazel and Roger Norrington are seen rehearsing passages from Beethoven’s symphonies with the Vienna Philharmonic and the Camerata Academica Salzburg. Creating a counterpoint to these sections are excerpts from performances by Leonard Bernstein and Herbert von Karajan, as well as historical footage of concerts led by Wilhelm Furtwängler and Arturo Toscanini. Also expressing their views are a number of other distinguished musicians such as Pierre Boulez, Claudio Abbado, John Eliot Gardiner and others. A fascinating panorama of contemporary interpretations of Beethoven’s music!
In Search of Beethoven – Part 3
In Search of Beethoven – Part 4
Making of Nabucco – Verdi’s Nabucco in Verona
After his first two operas “Oberto” and “Un giorno di regno,” Verdi fell into a depression that dissipated only when he was shown the libretto to “Nabucco” and discovered the chorus “Va, pensiero.” The words sung by the Hebrew exiles made an indelible impression on the composer, who also saw the political potential within them: an echo of the Italians’ longing for freedom and a unified nation. The work was premiered at the Teatro alla Scala on 9 March 1842 and was an enormous success. The story of the Babylonian King and the captive Israelites stirred a patriotic cord in the hearts of the Milan audiences and swiftly carried Verdi’s name throughout Italy and the rest of the world. “Nabucco” has long been at home in the Arena di Verona, and for many, the “Va pensiero” chorus is, along with the triumphal march from “Aida,” the very embodiment of the Verona experience. This video production vividly captures this unique experience and provides the viewer with fascinating details that escape many of the Arena’s spectators. Stage director Denis Krief casts the work in a sparse modern setting, providing a highly effective showcase for the true heroes of the evening, the singers under conductor Daniel Oren. “Nuanced and temperamental, Daniel Oren’s interpretation dazzles with wonderfully suspense-filled pianissimi. The chorus of the Hebrew captives is so perfect that it is probably impossible to find it sung anywhere else more beautifully than in Verona. […] As so often in the Arena, the chorus presents itself as protagonist and perfectly homogeneous ensemble in this acoustically delicate theater. But with Leo Nucci as an aging Nabucco reminiscent of Lear, Fabio Sartori as his antagonist Ismaele and Maria Guleghina as a power-hungry Abigaille, the stage was dominated by three brilliantly disposed soloists who rousingly did justice to the drama of their characters, who are struggling for power and love.” (Süddeutsche Zeitung, 26 June 2007)
Making of “Assassinio Nella Cattedrale”
What more appropriate venue for Ildebrando Pizzetti’s operatic masterwork of 1958 “Assassinio nella Cattedrale” than the austere, Romanic Basilica di San Nicola in the southern Italian port city of Bari. A striking coincidence: the action of T. S. Eliot’s stage play “Murder in the Cathedral”, on which the opera is based, takes place in December 1170; the Basilica di San Nicola also dates from the 12th century and was consecrated in 1197… Pizzetti, one of Italy’s leading lyrical composers of the first half of the 20th century, composed several operas, of which “Assassinio nella Cattedrale” is one of his most famous. It unites all the elements of his lyrical style, such as a supple arioso treatment of the text that bears echoes of Debussy’s “Pelléas et Mélisande” as well as of Monteverdi and the Florentine monodists; and powerful, surging choral movements that are even more breathtaking when performed in a church. Pizzetti’s religiosity also manifests itself in his choice of T.S. Eliot’s modern-day miracle play about St. Thomas Becket, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who returns from a seven-year-exile only to be confronted by various torments, including Four Temptations; he succumbs to the fourth, the temptation of martyrdom… Internationally acclaimed bass-baritone Ruggero Raimondi, at home on all of the world’s major stages and unforgotten as Don Giovanni in Joseph Losey’s celebrated 1979 film, brings the firmness and authority of his vocal artistry to this role, elevating it to one of the most passionate and intriguing portrayals of a 20th-century operatic hero.