Beethoven, Mozart & Brahms Piano Concertos
Pollini plays flawlessly, with the greatest finesse and sensitivity, very much in tune with each composer's personal style. His performances are exemplary in every respect. The video and audio are quite acceptable, given their 1970s vintage. Böhm and Abbado are at home in this repertoire, and the Wiener Philharmoniker in excellent form, notwithstanding a few strange noises coming from the horns.
Casts & Crew
Also Directed by Hugo Käch
Arthur Rubinstein performs Grieg's Piano Concerto in A minor, Op. 16, Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 2 in F minor, Op. 21, and Saint-Saens Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 22 with Andre Previn at the London Symphony at Fairfield Hall, Croydon, England.
Turandot at the Forbidden City is a 1998 live production of Puccini's opera Turandot directed by Zhang Yimou. The opera was performed by Giovanna Casolla, Audrey Stottler, and Sharon Sweet alternating as Princess Turandot; Kristján Jóhannsson, Sergej Larin and Lando Bartolini as Calàf; and Barbara Frittoli, Angela-Maria Blasi and Barbara Hendricks as Liù, with Zubin Mehta conducting the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino.
Live 1973 concert performances by celebrated Polish-American virtuoso concert pianist Arthur Rubinstein, with the Concertgebouw Orchestra under conductor Bernard Haitink. Filmed in August 1973 at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the performances include Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto, in C minor, op. 37; and Brahms's First Piano Concerto, in D minor, op. 15. These are followed by four short pieces for solo piano, by Schubert, Brahms, and Chopin. The 2008 DVD release by Deutsche Grammophon also includes a short documentary, "Rubinstein at 90", an interview with Robert MacNeil, filmed at Rubinstein's home in Paris in 1977.
A production of Strauss' opera 'Der Rosenkavalier' performed at the Saltzburg Festival in 1984. Includes the Vienna State Opera Choir, the Philharmonic Orchestra with singers Wilma Lipp, Anna Tomowa-Sintow and Agnes Baltsa. Conducted by Herbert Von Karaja
Requiem in D minor, K 626 by Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus Performer: Walter Berry Gundula Janowitz Christa Ludwig Peter Schreier Orchestra/Ensemble: Wienere Symphoniker Orchestra Conductor: Bohm Karl Chor der Wiener Staatsoper Period: Classical Written: 1971 ; UNITEL
Karl Bohm was 77 when this was filmed, and he looks about 60. He conducts with vigor, strength, and total musical solidity. I believe Bohm to be a better Mozart conductor than Herbert von Karajan (1908-1989) although Karajan is more famous and has had more recordings released in the US than Bohm. Karajan also recorded Mozart's "Requiem" at least three times for DG during the stereo era, the final one in DDD sound.
Live performance of Mozart's immortal Requiem in D minor from the Herkulessaal in Munich, 1984. Soprano Edith Mathis, alto Trudeliese Schmidt, tenor Peter Schreier, and bass Gwynne Howell, with the The Bavarian Radio Symphony and Orchestra, are conducted by Sir Colin Davis.
In the 1960s Karl Böhm (1894–1981) had made his mark as interpreter of Mozart with the the Berlin Philharmonic. Yet his recordings with the Vienna Symphony demonstrate a mutual sympathy and deep love for this timeless music. The musicians are razor-sharp in attack, harmony, and release. Böhm's style is minimalist: a firm downbeat, a ruffled hand here and there, a slight sway, no mugging. Occasionally, when quite excited, he gives a little hop but immediately pulls himself on a tight leash.
Recorded live at the Vienna State Opera, Placido Domingo and Eva Marton star in a sumptuous recording of Ponchielli's famed four-act melodrama, a story of tyranny and intrigue set in semi-historical and ever-romantic Venice. The action is projected by strong characters whose fundamentally sound instincts become distorted by raw passion. The performance draws upon both human and technical resources including a large ballet and varies in mood from the happy carnival to scenes of the darkest gloom and horror.
Emil Gilels is well known as a Beethoven interpreter. His approach is characterized by a full bodied sound throughout a wide dynamic range, complete virtuosity and a structural sense that gives clarity to both local and global musical events. His tempo choices make sense within a complete movement or entire sonata (he doesn't need to slow down dramatically for the second subject in Op.53's first movement) and he will mostly maintain a tempo with only slight fluctuations.
Also Directed by Christopher Nupen
A documentary portrait of famed Ukrainian-American violinist Nathan Milstein (1903–92), covering his life and career through conversations with the artist and with some of his notable students, interspersed with brief performances and followed by two concert performances.
The struggles of the world’s Jewish people over the course of several centuries are expressed and explored through the music they inspired in this documentary from the BBC and Opus Arte. We Want the Light brings together harrowing tales from Holocaust survivors with performances of music by such legendary composers as Mahler, Bach, Mendelssohn, and Brahms. Interviews with: Alice Sommer Herz, Jacques Stroumsa, Evgeny Kissin, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Zubin Mehta, Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zukerman, Toby Perlman, Michael Haas, Elyakim Ha’etzni, Norman Lebrecht, Margaret Brearley, Paul Lawrence Rose, Daniel Barenboim, Yirmiyahu Yovel, Uri Toeplitz & Anita Lasker-Wallfisch. Featuring: Gürzenich-Orchester Köln, Cologne Cathedral Children’s Choir & Cologne Opera Chorus.
Russian pianist Evgeny Kissin delivers a virtuoso performance of remarkable depth and artistry in this 1990 concert recorded live in Munich at Bavaria Musikstudios. Selections include Franz Schubert's Fantasy in C Major, D 760 ("Wanderer"), Johannes Brahms's Fantasies, op. 116, Franz Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody no. 12, J.S. Bach's "Siciliana" and Christoph Willibald Gluck's "Melody Dance of the Blessed Spirits."
Christopher Nupen's record of the concert given by five young musicians in the new Queen Elizabeth Hall at London's South Bank, in 1969. The Trout is an exuberant explosion of youthful enjoyment in music: first from Schubert himself, who wrote his famous Trout quintet when he was 22 years old, and then from five young artists of the highest rank. They pick up the spirit of Schubert's music magnificently, both in preparation and rehearsal, and in their 1969 performance of the work, which has become one of the most remembered ever given. Includes personal introductions by Christopher Nupen and Jacqueline du Pré and features the legendary 1969 performance of The Trout with Daniel Barenboim, Itzhak Perlman, Jacqueline du Pré, Pinchas Zukerman and Zubin Mehta.
In April 1981 violinist Gidon Kremer performed Vivaldi's Four Seasons leading the English Chamber Orchestra recorded in the baroque library of the monastery in Polling, near Munich. It is, as one would expect from a master violinist, a superbly insightful performance. The sound is resonant and satisfying although surely not true 5.1, and those who wish to have this music on video might well investigate it.
The Greatest Love and the Greatest Sorrow is a film which sets out to bring the viewer closer, not to the details of Schubert's life, but to the spirit of what he was trying to express with what he called his creative gift and with which he tried "to brighten the world". The film begins with the funeral of Beethoven, at which Schubert was a torch-bearer, His story is told almost entirely in music written in the twenty months that remained to him after that date, together with quotations from Schubert's letters, diaries and the words that he chose to set in some of his songs. Includes personal introductions by Christopher Nupen and Jacqueline du Pré and features the legendary 1969 performance of The Trout with Daniel Barenboim, Itzhak Perlman, Jacqueline du Pré, Pinchas Zukerman and Zubin Mehta.
Documentary about pianist and Holocaust survivor Alice Sommer Herz. In the concentration camps she played more than 100 concerts, and credits music for saving her life.
Documentary on the life and career of violinist Itzhak Perlman, including interviews, archival footage, and concert performances.
Born with the gift from nature, polished by years of painstaking work, Pinchas Zukerman was between the ages of 7 and 17 the best teaching that could possibly be found. His well-spent youth established him with an international career before he was 21. The close friendship between the artist and the director, Christopher Nupen, provides not only an interesting documentary but also a touching immersion in the intimacy of one of the greatest violinists the world has ever known.
Documentary about Soviet-born pianist Vladimir Ashkenazy.
Also Directed by Franz Kabelka
1987 recording of Wozzeck by the Vienna State Opera with Claudio Abbado conducting. Based upon Georg Büchner's 1837 play, Alban Berg's Wozzeck details the harsh existence of the title character, a former soldier in the German army who has to struggle mightily to make a living, even as others around him prosper.