Schedule

Fidelio (originally titled "Leonore, oder Der Triumph der ehelichen Liebe," which translates to "Leonore, or the Triumph of Marital Love"), Op. 72, is Ludwig van Beethoven's only opera. This 2018 opera film from the Swiss Theater St. Gallen is based on Jan Schmidt-Garre's highly acclaimed stage production of Beethoven's Fidelio. Otto Tausk conducts the Sinfonieorchester and choir of St. Gallen, as well as many wonderful soloists in a beautifully designed set by Nikolaus Webern. The producers carefully filmed and edited several performances, and by using additional footage of starring soloist Jacquelyn Wagner as Leonore, the captivating stage production is enhanced and transformed into a unique cinematic experience.

English-French pianist David Levy performs Dmitri Shostakovich’s 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87. The work is a set of twenty-four pieces for piano, one in each of the major and minor keys of the chromatic scale. Each piece is in two parts: a prelude followed by a fugue. The composer was doubtlessly inspired by J. S. Bach’s famous The Well-Tempered Clavier (BWV 846-893), a collection of forty-eight preludes and fugues published in two books. A panel member at Leipzig’s Bach competition, Shostakovich was deeply inspired by Russian pianist Tatiana Nikolayeva’s performance of Bach’s 48 Preludes and Fugues. Shostakovich wrote these pieces between the autumn of 1950 and February 1951, dedicating them to Nikolayeva, who agreed to perform the Leningrad premiere in December 1952. David Levy’s performance was recorded at the Budapest Music Center, Hungary, in September 2023.

Conductor Herbert Blomstedt and the Gewandhausorchester take us on a musical journey to the Czech Republic in this 2020 concert from Leipzig’s Gewandhaus. The program opens with Bohemian composer Jan Václav Hugo Voríšek’s Symphony in D major, Op. 23 (1821). Although the composition – Voríšek’s only symphony – was never performed during the composer’s lifetime, it has become one of his most-performed works today. Also on the program is Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Symphony No. 38 in D major, K. 504. This work, which premiered while Mozart was visiting Prague in 1787, is often referred to as the ‘Prague Symphony’.

J. S. Bach’s six Brandenburg Concerto’s belong to his best-known works. The composer wrote these concertos between 1711 and 1720 and dedicated them in 1721 to Christian Ludwig, Margrave of Brandenburg. In celebration of the pieces’ 300th anniversary, Czech harpsichordist and conductor Václav Luks and the renowned Baroque ensemble Collegium 1704 recorded all six Brandenburg Concertos on historical instruments in 2021. The concertos are based on the Italian concerto grosso form, in which a group of solo instruments is set against a large ensemble. Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos feature remarkable combinations of solo instruments and virtuoso solos. In this performance at the Hall of Mirrors in the Köthen Castle, Germany, Luks and his Collegium 1704 present Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 in B-flat major, BWV 1051. Contrary to the other five concertos, this piece does not include violins, instead offering the floor to the lower strings and the harpsichord.

J. S. Bach’s six Brandenburg Concerto’s belong to his best-known works. The composer wrote these concertos between 1711 and 1720 and dedicated them in 1721 to Christian Ludwig, Margrave of Brandenburg. In celebration of the pieces’ 300th anniversary, Czech harpsichordist and conductor Václav Luks and the renowned Baroque ensemble Collegium 1704 recorded all six Brandenburg Concertos on historical instruments in 2021. The concertos are based on the Italian concerto grosso form, in which a group of solo instruments is set against a large ensemble. Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos feature remarkable combinations of solo instruments and virtuoso solos. In this performance at the Hall of Mirrors in the Köthen Castle, Germany, Luks and his Collegium 1704 present Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 1 in F major, BWV 1046. This concerto was written for strings, woodwinds, and brass, and features solos from each instrument group.

Baritone Samuel Hasselhorn and pianist Daniel Heide perform Franz Schubert’s song cycle Winterreise (‘Winter’s journey’). The 30-year-old Schubert wrote this masterpiece in 1827, just a year before his death. Like Schubert’s earlier song cycle Die schöne Müllerin (1823), Winterreise is a setting of the poetry of Wilhelm Müller (1794-1827). In twenty-four songs, we follow a rejected young man on a lonely journey through a frozen landscape. Wandering as a lost soul, tormented by his memories, the man searches for peace. This performance was recorded at Schloss Wörlitz, part of the Dessau-Wörlitz Garden Realm, near Dessau, the birthplace and final resting place of Wilhelm Müller.

2024 marks the 100th anniversary of Gabriel Fauré's death. He is considered one of the most important and influential composers, having been the teacher of Maurice Ravel, Georges Enescu, Nadia Boulanger and many others. The Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse and The Philharmonic Chorus of Tokyo, with Florian Sempey as soloist, perform Gabriel Fauré's Requiem in the Basilique de Saint-Sernin in Toulouse, the largest surviving Romanesque church in France and one of the most important buildings in Romanesque architecture. This extraordinary concert is conducted by Kazuki Yamada, who is currently one of the most exciting young maestros. In spring 2023, he was appointed Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, and is also Artistic and Musical Director of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo.

The documentary 'Heavenly Voices – The Legacy of Farinelli' (2012) tells us the story of the castrato in music – male singers who were castrated at a young age in order to preserve their high vocal range, a cruel practice that was in place mainly in the 17th and 18th centuries. For two centuries, castrati's performances held European audiences spellbound, with successful castrati such as Farinelli ranking among the most influential and highest-earning musicians of those days. Today, roles originally written for castrati are often performed by countertenors. In this documentary, countertenors Max Emanuel Cenčić, Philippe Jaroussky, Andreas Scholl, Franco Fagioli, and Jochen Kowalski discuss Baroque-era operatic entertainment. 'Heavenly Voices' is a film by Gino Pennacchi (writer) and Alessandro Scillitani (director).

One of the world’s most popular pieces of classical music, Maurice Ravel’s Boléro (1928), was no longer copyrighted as of May 1, 2016. Up to then it had made Ravel and his heirs millions. Ravel died in 1937 and left all he owned to his brother Edouard. Edouard’s death in 1960 unleashed a complex legal battle over the rights, involving among others Edouard’s nurse and her husband. This 2017 documentary gives a fascinating account of what happened to one this iconic piece of music right under the nose of the public. Filmmaker Fabien Caux-Lahalle underpins this investigative story with clips of the Boléro in various guises.

Renowned French string quartet Quatuor Ébène marked the 250th birth anniversary of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) with a remarkable project: recording all of the great composer’s sixteen string quartets. For five years, violinists Pierre Colombet and Gabriel Le Magadure, violist Marie Chilemme, and cellist Raphaël Merlin immersed themselves in Beethoven’s 650 pages of sheet music. Their efforts culminated in the performance of the composer’s complete repertoire for string quartet, which covers three decades of Beethoven's musical creativity, during six impressive concerts at Philharmonie de Paris in the autumn of 2020. Quatuor Ébène explored every facet of Beethoven's string quartet repertoire: from the youthful Opus 18 string quartets to the Razumovsky, Harp, and Serioso quartets (Opus 59, 74, and 95) from his middle period, and finally, the depth of his late quartets (Opus 127 to 135). This program features Quatuor Ébène performing Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 2 in G major, Op. 18, No. 2; String Quartet No. 16 in F major, Op. 135; and String Quartet No. 14 in C-sharp minor, Op. 131. This concert was recorded at Philharmonie de Paris on December 16, 2020.

Rodolfo Barráez conducts the Orchestra and Choir of the Academia de Musica del Palacia de Mineria in a performance of Carl Orff's cantata Carmina Burana. Soloists are Anabel de la Mora (soprano), Andrés Carrillo (tenor) and Daniel Cerón (baritone). Carmina Burana, composed in 1935 and 1936, is based on 24 poems from a medieval manuscript of the same name. The full title is "Songs from Beuern: Secular songs for singers and choruses to be sung together with instruments and magical images". It was first performed at the Oper Frankfurt on June 8, 1937.