Towards the end of his life, the composer Bedrich Smetana (1824-84) wrote a cycle of symphonic poems, Má Vlast (My Country), a vivid, patriotic musical portait of his homeland, Bohemia. This superb recording features the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra under the baton of the Czech conductor Rafael Kubelik.
Barry Tuckwell: Master of the Horn
The celebrated Australian horn player, Barry Tuckwell, traces how one of the earliest primitive instruments developed the form and sound it has today and became an important part of the symphony orchestra. Accompanied by the English Chamber Orchestra, he is seen performing works by Telemann, Schumann, Beethoven, Britten and Mozart.
Stephen Sondheim
With shows including A Little Night Music, Company and Sweeney Todd, Sondheim established himself as the foremost music dramatist of his generation. In this programme, he describes the key processes involved in song writing, and works with students from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London on the interpretation of some of his most memorable songs.
Claudio Arrau
This profile of the great Chilean pianist, who died in 1991 at the age of eighty-eight, was made in 1984. Throughout his long career his interpretations remained unparalleled in their depth of feeling, virtuosity and fidelity to the text. In the film he talks about his life and work and performs pieces by Beethoven (‘Appassionata’ Sonata No. 23 Op. 57 in F minor), Chopin (Ballade No. 3 in A flat), Debussy (L’Isle joyeuse), Liszt (Petrarch Sonnet No. 104) and Schubert (Klavierstück in E flat minor, D946), describing his feelings for these composers.
Ralph Vaughan Williams – A Symphonic Portrait
Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) was a quintessentially English, strongly individual and very personal composer. Ken Russell’s delightful and original tribute to this great man of twentieth-century music uses extracts from his nine symphonies to sketch the story of his life. Vivid memories of Vaughan Williams are recounted by his widow, Ursula, and others who knew him.
Hertejoch Zanker
Jaap Drupsteen adapted a successful music theatre production, using a wide range of special effects and computer graphics, to create this extraordinary video fantasy. A series of scenes, as intriguing and illogical as those in dreams, make up a dramatic story-line which involves characters every bit as strange as those who inhabit the plays of Samuel Beckett. Music forms an integral part of the piece, creating and underlining tensions between the characters.
Glyndebourne: A Celebration of Fifty Years
Taking a closer look at Glyndebourne’s world-famous opera house set in the heart of the Sussex countryside, this film goes behind the scenes and meets the people who create its unique atmosphere and sense of occasion. The exciting 50th Anniversary season in 1984 was chosen to reflect some of the works which have been particularly significant in the history of the Festival. In this documentary there is film of rehearsals for new productions of Le nozze di Figaro and Così fan tutte, the two operas with which Glyndebourne opened in 1934. These are both directed by Sir Peter Hall. There is also film of Hall’s preparations for Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea and Benjamin Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. John Cox is seen working on Richard Strauss’s Arabella.
Torso
Czech choreographer Jiri Kylián was moved to create Torso by the plight of the Russian dancers, Valery and Galina Panov, who found asylum in Israel. His own experience of being cut off from his homeland, after the Dubcek regime was crushed, has been a lasting influence on his work. This ballet, set to music by Toru Takemitsu, and dedicated to all in exile, expresses a profound feeling of dislocation. Sabine Kupferberg and Leigh Warren feature in this studio recording.
John Piper
English artist John Piper (1903-92) is best known for his romantic pictures of the country’s architectural heritage and landscape. This film surveys his long career – his early abstract paintings, his work as a war artist, his return to representational art – and explores a talent which was expressed in watercolours, oils, ceramics, stained glass, tapestry and opera designs.
Catherine Cookson
Catherine Cookson (1906-98) was a writer who won a huge popular following and many of her books have been successfully dramatised for television. This programme employs an innovative combination of film and video techniques to evoke her struggle to survive an impoverished upbringing in the slums of East Jarrow. Cookson confronts her past which led to a massive and terrifying nervous breakdown many years afterwards. She talks candidly about her life and the experiences that underlie her fiction.