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PG02:35:001985HD

Schwetzingen, a small German town near Heidelberg, boasts a famous palace with gardens as magnificent as those at Versailles. In the spring, the palace is the backdrop for the Schwetzingen Festival. Every year, the festival commissions a small-scale opera for the palace's exquisite Rococo theatre, built in 1752. Agrippina is a brilliant early George Frideric Handel opera. Composed when he was just twenty-four, it was Handel's first big hit in the theater. It’s full of his fresh, exuberantly inventive music, and set to a libretto by Cardinal Vincenzo Grimani, one of the finest librettists Handel ever worked with. This staging of Agrippina was recorded under the baton of Arnold Östman, a renowned specialist in the music of the 17th and 18th centuries. The London Baroque Players accompany Barbara Daniels, Janice Hall, and David Kuebler in Michael Hampe's elegant and colourful production that shows us the perfidious intrigues of the power-crazy Empress Agrippina, and the criminal power struggles in classical Rome.

G01:44:002007HD

The 2007 Europa-Konzert takes place in Berlin, on the occasion of the 125th anniversary of the Berliner Philharmoniker. Under the theme "The Year 1882", the acclaimed orchestra is lead by conductor Sir Simon Rattle as it interprets Brahms’ “Concerto for violin, cello and orchestra”, his Fourth Symphony and Wagners’ “Prelude to Act I” from Parsifal - the piece that marked the orchestra's first recorded work of September 1913 under the baton of Alfred Hertz. The soloists are Lisa Batiashvili (violin) and Truls Mørk (cello), established as sought-after young virtuosos and appearing regularly with leading orchestras and in recitals throughout the world. The “Kraftwerk und Kabelwerk Oberspree (power and cable factory)”, the remarkable venue of this concert, is one of the most impressive historical industrial building from the late 19th century in Berlin. As its impressive presence is infused with Brahms and Wagner, there is an air of total commitment, only enhanced further by the unusual surroundings. The collaboration of Lisa Batiashvili and Truls Mørk ensures a moving performance of Brahms’s last orchestral work, his Double Concerto. Following this, Rattle and the orchestra continue to demonstrate their outstanding musicianship, delivering Wagner's amazingly fresh and dynamic Fourth Symphony.

04:19
Brendel and Abbado at Lucerne Festival
G00:43:002005HD
Ludwig van Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor, Op. 37 - Anton Bruckner: Symphony No. 7 in E major. Alfred Brendel (piano), Lucerne Festival Orchestra; conductor: Claudio Abbado. The Lucerne Festival is one of the world's biggest and most important music festivals. Its history began with the inaugural concert on 25 August 1938 conducted by Arturo Toscanini. In 2003, Claudio Abbado, who had been a regular guest at the festival since 1966, became director of the newly founded Lucerne Festival Orchestra. Until his death in January 2014 he inspired his "orchestra family" to play top-class performances. The Lucerne Festival Orchestra consists of musicians of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and of international soloists.

G00:48:002021HD

Mexican conductor Carlos Miguel Prieto leads the Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería in a performance of Aaron Copland’s Appalachian Spring Suite. Originally commissioned as a ballet for the legendary dancer Martha Graham, Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring (1944) has since become an American classic. While first scored for a thirteen-piece ensemble, Copland later arranged the work for a full orchestra. This performance was recorded at Auditorio Nacional in Mexico City, in 2021.

G00:09:002024HD

Pianist Jakub Kuszlik (Poland, 1996) joins the CMIM ensemble, consisting of three principal strings players of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, in a performance of the first movement, Sostenuto assai – Allegro ma non troppo, of Robert Schumann’s Piano Quartet in E-flat major, Op. 47. This performance took place during the chamber music round of the two-part semi-final of the Piano Edition of the Concours musical international de Montréal 2024 (CMIM). It was recorded at the Bourgie Hall of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

G00:35:001991HD

W. A. Mozart composed his Piano Concerto in D Major, KV. 537 in Vienna in February 1788. This concerto was later nicknamed "Coronation" because Mozart played it in October 1790 when Leopold II was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in Frankfurt am Main. In this broadcast, the Uruguay-born Swiss pianist Homero Francesch is accompanied by the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, under the baton of Gerd Albrecht. Francesch has performed as a soloist with the most renowned orchestras from the Berliner Philharmoniker, the Wiener Philharmoniker, the New York Philharmonic, and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. This program was recorded at the Christian-Zais-Saal in Wiesbaden, Germany.

G01:37:002020HD

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. 5 in A major, Op. 18, No. 5; String Quartet No. 4 in C minor, Op. 18, No. 4; and String Quartet No. 12 in E-flat major, Op. 127. This concert was recorded at Philharmonie de Paris on December 17, 2020.

G01:05:002023HD

Italian conductor Mattia Rondelli conducts the Orchestra dell’Opera Carlo Felice Genova in a concert program consisting of works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Giuseppe Sarti. Soprano Barbara Massaro is the soloist. On the program are Mozart’s Symphony No. 5 in B-flat major, K. 22; ‘Domine Deus’ from Sarti’s Gloria in excelsis (revised by Stefano Squarzina); ‘Sinfonia’, and the aria ‘Sull’altare del Suo sdegno’ from Sarti’s oratorio La sconfitta de’ Cananei (rev. S. Squarzina); Mozart’s Symphony No. 27 in G major, K. 199; the aria ‘Fra le oscure ombre funeste’ from Mozart’s cantata Davide Penitente, K. 469; and Mozart’s Symphony No. 24 in B-flat major, K. 182. This performance was recorded at the basilica of Santi Gervasio e Protasio in Rapallo, Italy, in 2023.

G00:41:002024HD

Pianist Carter Johnson (Canada, 1996) performs Maurice Ravel’s Valses nobles et sentimentales, and Paul Hindemith’s Sonata No. 3 in B-flat major, during the first round of the Piano Edition of the Concours musical international de Montréal 2024 (CMIM). This performance was recorded at the Bourgie Hall of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

G00:55:002001HD

Maestro Mariss Jansons conducts the Berlin Philharmonic in a performance of Hector Berlioz' Symphonie fantastique, Op. 14. This performance is part of the Europakonzert 2001, recorded at Hagia Irene in Istanbul, Turkey.

G01:34:002020HD

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.

G00:26:002000HD

British conductor John Eliot Gardiner performs all of Johann Sebastian Bach's cantatas in a concert series. Several of these concerts take place in Saxony and Thuringia, where Bach lived. This offers Gardiner the opportunity to discover Bach, his life and work in his own, very personal way. Bach Revisited follows Gardiner to Eisenach, Arnstadt, Pomßen and Leipzig. The British conductor visits the old church at Pomßen, discovers that Martin Luther and J.S. Bach attended the same school, and discusses the new Bach organ in St Thomas's Church in Leipzig with the local organist.

G00:34:002021HD

Acclaimed classical music talent scout Antonio Mormone (1930-2017) lives on as the name-giver of the Premio Internazionale Antonio Mormone (PIAM), awarded to the winner of the Italian music competition of the same name. The first edition of this competition, which was held in various venues in Milan from 2019 to 2021, was dedicated to the piano. As part of this competition, Ying Li (China, 1997) performs Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Sonata No. 13 in B-flat major, K. 333, and Béla Bartók’s Sonata, BB 88, Sz.80. This performance was recorded at Nuovo Teatro Ariberto in Milan, in June 2021.

G00:28:001993HD

Every year, the Europakonzert is hosted by the Berliner Philharmoniker in a notorious concert hall or on a special location. This years concert is performed at the magnificent Royal Albert Hall in London. The Dutch conductor Bernard Haitink starts with Tchaikovsky's Fantasy Overture from "Roméo et Juliette". The second piece by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is his famous Violin Concerto No. 3 in G major K. 216 played by the German violinist Frank Peter Zimmermann. During his career he played with a lot of famous orchestras and conductors such as the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Mariss Jansons. He has a great passion for chamber music and plays a lot of recitals with the Italian pianist Enrico Pace. The concert closes with Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring which he wrote in 1913 for Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. The première caused a lot of sensation and near-riot in the audience because of the avant-garde nature, music and choreography of the piece. The Rite of Spring is now considered as one of the masterpieces of classical music history and has influenced many 20th-century music composers. The encore is Tchaikovsky's Flower Waltz from the Nutcracker.

G01:45:002010HD

Pierre Boulez conducts the Berlin Philharmonic in this program dedicated to the music of Béla Bartók. Gidon Kremer, one of the leading violinists of our day, performs Bartók’s Concerto for Violin and Orchestra No. 1 (Sz. 36); Yuri Bashmet, one of the finest viola players of our time, is the featured soloist in Bartók’s Concerto for Viola und Orchestra (Sz. 120). The orchestra plays The Miraculous Mandarin (Sz. 73) and Dance Suite (Sz. 77).

G00:39:002008HD

Sir Simon Rattle conducts the Berliner Philharmonic during the 2008 edition of the Europakonzert, held in the renowned hall of the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow. The first edition of the Europakonzert was in 1991, and since then, the founding of the Berlin Philharmonic on May 1st in 1882 is annually celebrated with a concert in a European city of cultural significance. The orchestra opens with an outstanding performance of Stravinsky’s Symphony in Three Movements. Furthermore, Vadim Repin, one of today’s most fascinating artists, features as soloist in Bruch’s Concerto for Violin No. 1, Op, 26. The orchestra concludes with a performance of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7, of which the second movement, Allegretto, gained instant popularity after its premiere in 1813 and remains a crowd favorite.

G01:22:002020HD

This dance concert - performed in the languages of both music and movement - features, in addition to works by Liszt, some of the finest pieces of Hungary's national romanticism that served to inspire them, antecedents of sacred music reaching as far back as the Gregorian period and compositions by contemporaries who influenced Liszt: Paganini and Chopin. Liszt Mosaics is founded on three thematic pillars. Although all three directly evoke Liszt - with emblematic aspects of his life's work: Liszt the Hungarian, Liszt the priest and Liszt the virtuoso - they speak at least as much to us as people of the 21st century. The Hungarian State Folk Ensemble was established in 1951 and has traveled to over 40 countries, playing authentic folk music and folk dances.

G01:23:002016HD

This 2016 concert at Chambord Castle in France under the direction of Hervé Niquet features 70 musicians that gave a spectacular performance of Handel‘s Water Music and Music for the Royal Fireworks. In between Le Concert Spirituel also plays Concerto Grosso’s No. 4 and No. 5 also by Georg Friedrich Handel. After that you can enjoy the celebrated movement of Marc- Antoine Charpentier’s Te Deum, now universally known as the signature tune of Eurovision. The music brings to mind the splendor at the court of King Louis XIV, who sojourned in Chambord on several occasions.

G01:18:002006HD

In 2006, Gidon Kremer and Martha Argerich set out on tour performing solos and duets by Bartók und Schumann. The last of the concert series at the Berliner Philharmonie has been recorded for this film, featuring a rare solo performance by Martha Argerich. A concert film with personal and moving commentary by Gidon Kremer. Program: Schumann's Violin Sonata No. 1, Op. 10, Violin Sonata No. 2, Op. 121; Kinderszenen, Op. 15; Bartók: Violin Sonata No. 1 Sz 75; Violin sonata No. 2 Sz 76.

G01:02:002020HD

Chorus Director Emeritus Simon Halsey conducts the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO) and Chorus in the festive concert ‘A Singalong Christmas’. Joined by soprano Abigail Kelly and bass-baritone Rodney Earl Clarke, the LSO presents a full program of festive works to sing along with. The program includes: Carillon on 'Angelus ad Virginem'; African Noel; Adam Lay Ybounden; Carol of the Crib; Babe of Bethlehem; Shepherd's Hey; The First Nowell; Sir Christmas; Hark! The Herald Angels Sing; Christmas Overture; Tomorrow shall be my dancing day; Shout for Joy!; Sleigh Ride; and O Come, All Ye Faithful. This atmospheric concert was recorded at LSO St. Luke's in London, UK, on October 21, 2020.

G00:59:001999HD

This splendid Christmas concert was recorded live from the Freiburg Cathedral in 1999. It features soprano Barbara Bonney, recognized worldwide for the clarity of her voice and the precision of her diction, and the baritone Matthias Goerne, one of the most promising singers of his generation. Accompanied by the Baroque Orchestra of Freiburg and the German Brass, they perform pieces from Bach's Christmas Oratorio (BWV 248), Mozart's Mass in C minor (KV 427), and Handel's Messiah.

G00:30:002017HD

On 18 December 2017, the Valerius Ensemble played a Christmas concert in Concordia, Enschede. The ensemble consists of Robert Windak (violin), Annemarie van Vliegen (violin), Eva Šušliková (viola) and Réne Geesing (cello). The program consists of “Das neugeborne Kindelein” from Bachs Cantata BWV 122, the Largo from Vivaldi’s Winter, the Allegro from Mozart’s Divertimento in D (KV. 136), Méditation from Massenet’s opera “Thaïs,” The Entertainer by Scott Joplin, the Vilja song from Léhars “Die Lustige Witwe” and the animated Romanian folk-tune Geampara. The Ensemble closes with Piazzolla’s Ave Maria (Tanti anni prima).

G00:58:002015HD

Les Dissonances is a collective of artists founded by violinist David Grimal in 2004. The conductorless ensemble consists of musicians from the most prestigious European orchestras, international soloists, and young talents. In this performance, Les Dissonances play Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Serenade No. 10 for winds in B-flat major, K. 361, also known as the ‘Gran Partita’. The composition is written for twelve winds and double bass and consists of seven parts. The piece’s duration is longer than the composer’s other chamber music works. Remarkably, Mozart chose to use a larger instrumentation. To the eight instruments of the common wind octet, Mozart added two basset horns, two additional horns, and a double bass. This performance was recorded at Philharmonie de Paris, France, in 2015.