“Pagliacci” is often celebrated as one of the finest examples of verismo, or realist opera. It is even based on a true story: Leoncavallo’s father, a judge, once presided over the trial of an actor who, in a fit of jealousy, murdered his wife immediately following a performance. “Pagliacci” is frequently performed along with Mascagni’s one-acter “Cavalleria Rusticana”. Both works are strongly linked with the name of Franco Zeffirelli, the great stage and film director who has been infusing the operatic repertoire with grace, elegance and poignancy. Both his Emmy Award-winning production of “Pagliacci” and his “Cavalleria” feature international star tenor Placido Domingo.
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.
Pilobolus on Broadway
The Pilobolus dance theatre company founded by Moses Pendleton and Jonathan Wolken is renowned for its originality and irreverence. This studio recording shows off the zany Pilobolus style and includes three pieces choreographed by the company themselves: The Empty Suitor, which is danced to a selection of jazz numbers; Walklyndon, with its atmospheric sound effects; and Day Two, set to music specially composed, arranged and produced by Gordon Johnson.
Rudolf II
This dramatised portrait of the Bohemian king brings to life the court where he amassed an art collection beyond value and brought together leading writers, artists and humanist scholars of his day, including astronomers Tycho Brahe and Johan Kepler, artist Arcimboldo, and mystics such as Giordano Bruno and John Dee. Rudolf suffered the torments of schizophrenia and was a sick and humiliated man when he died in 1612, but his reign was still a golden age in the cultural history of Prague.
Missa Sancta Caecilia
A legendary performance of Haydn’s Missa Sanctae Ceaciliae conducted by Rafael Kubelík live from the Basilika Ottobeuren. The work was without doubt one of the highlights of the wonderful Kubelík era. Under his guidance the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks also became one of the world’s foremost Haydn orchestras. When the orchestra discovered the baroque Basilica of Ottobeuren as the perfect venue for sacred music of the classic-romantic repertoire, their concerts enjoyed huge popularity, leaving a lasting impression on those who experienced them at first hand.
Simone de Beauvior
The lifelong companion to Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir (1908-86) was a champion of women’s rights and one of the leading philosopher-novelists of the Existentialist school in France. In this, the last in-depth television interview she gave before her death, de Beauvoir talks about the most significant events that she and France faced during her lifetime. The film features dramatised extracts from her novels and archive footage.
Frida Kahlo
Frida Kahlo (1907-54), wife of Diego Rivera, lived at the political and artistic centre of the Mexican Revolution, but her paintings are uniquely personal. They reflect the anguish she suffered following an accident when she was sixteen which left her in constant pain and unable to bear children. Both beautiful and frightening, Breton described her art as “a ribbon around a bomb”. This portrait was filmed in Mexico, particularly at the Blue House where she lived.
William Walton Gala Concert
Sir Andre Previn conducts the Philharmonia Orchestra in this gala concert, given to mark the eightieth birthday of one of Britain’s best-loved twentieth-century composers, Sir William Walton (1902-83). Recorded live from London’s Royal Festival Hall, in Walton’s presence, it features three of his most famous works: the Coronation march, Orb and Sceptre, Concerto for Violin in B minor (soloist Kyung-Wha Chung), and Belshazzar’s Feast for baritone (Sir Thomas Allen), chorus (the Philharmonia Chorus) and orchestra.
Piano Concerto in G Major
This live recording, from London’s Royal Festival Hall, of a performance of Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G features two legendary artists – pianist Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli (1920-95) and conductor Sergiu Celibidache (1912-96). They perform with the London Symphony Orchestra. An introduction to the programme includes an interview with Celibidache about Michelangeli’s flawless, yet seemingly effortless, technique.
The Beggar’s Opera
John Gay (1685-1732), a genial poet and playwright with a talent for satire, got the idea for The Beggar’s Opera from his friend, the satirist Jonathan Swift, who had mentioned to him that “A Newgate pastoral might make a pretty sort of thing”. In general, ballad opera, set among London’s criminal classes and full of satirical jibes about corruption in high places, suited English taste better than Handel’s heroic operas by the 1720s.
Created specially for television, this Beggar’s Opera captures the quality and satiric edge of the Hogarth engravings which influenced Gay’s original version.
The music for this production has been arranged from the eighteenth-century folksongs of the original (selected by Johann Christoph Pepusch) by baroque specialists Jeremy Barlow and John Eliot Gardiner, who conducts The English Baroque Soloists, performing on authentic period instruments.
Roger Daltrey, lead singer of The Who and star of the films including Tommy, McVicar and Lisztomania, heads a distinguished cast as the villainous hero Macheath.