Schedule

With Rolando Villazón directing and playing the title role, the world rushed for tickets to the Baden-Baden 2012 Pentecost-holiday opera. Following his directorial debut in 2011 (Werther, Lyon) the Mexican tenor went a step further, staging Gaetano Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore and directing himself in the role of Nemorino. The film tells the story of this “story within a story” and reveals the creative process of staging the comic opera in two acts at the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden in April and May 2012. We follow Rolando Villazón in rehearsals with singers and actors, and in his exchanges with young conductor Pablo Heras-Casado on the way to a highly personal performance.

In this performance from the 25th anniversary edition of the Verbier Festival, Seong-Jin Cho pays tribute to Debussy on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the French composer’s death. Cho’s refined palette of color and superb technical mastery is perfectly suited for revealing the subtle harmonic invention of Images. Schumann’s Fantasiestücke, Op.12 are rarely featured in concert programs. This half-hour long cycle is a challenge for the performer who has to demonstrate an extreme versatility of moods ranging from the dark “Des Abends”, the angst-filled “In der Nacht” to the virtuous “Traumeswirren”. With Chopin’s Op.58, Cho shows his ability in the grand sonata form and his affinity for the composer that earned him the distinction by winning the First Prize of the 2015 Chopin competition. Recorded at the 2018 edition of the Verbier Festival in Switzerland.

In September 2016, we celebrated the birthday of one of Japan's best-known conductors: Seiji Ozawa. Renowned for his advocacy of modern composers, Ozawa founded the Saito Kinen Festival Matsumoto in 1992. As of 2015, it is better known as the Seiji Ozawa Festival. Seiji Ozawa appeared on stage himself with 63 Saito Kinen Orchestra members, passionately conducting Beethoven's Symphony No. 2 and No. 7. Beethoven's Second Symphony was mostly written during the composer's stay at Heiligenstadt, at a time when his deafness was becoming more pronounced. The work premiered in the Theater an der Wien in Vienna on April 5, 1803. The Seventh Symphony premiered with Beethoven himself conducting in Vienna in 1813 at a charity concert for wounded soldiers. The Allegretto was the most popular movement and had to be encored.

Mikhail Pletnev leads the Russian National Orchestra in a performance of Maurice Ravel's Piano Concerto in G major, featuring Lucas Debargue as the soloist. The composer completed this lively three-movement Piano Concerto in 1931. He incorporated several jazz elements in the work, especially in the two outer movements. This performance was recorded at Tchaikovsky Concert Hall in Moscow, Russia, in 2017, as part of the Ninth RNO Grand Festival.

Pianist Arisa Onoda (Japan, 1996) joins the CMIM ensemble, consisting of three principal strings players of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, in a performance of the first movement, Allegro molto moderato, of Gabriel Fauré’s Piano Quartet No. 1 in C minor, Op. 15. 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 Bourgie Hall in the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

At St. Bartholomew Church in Dornheim, Germany, where composer Johann Sebastian Bach married his first wife Maria Barbara, renowned Dutch cellist Anner Bijlsma performs the composer's Cello Suite No. 1 in G major, BWV 1007. It is likely Bach wrote his collection of six Suites for unaccompanied cello during the years 1717-1723. His cello suites are an essential part of the cello repertoire, highlighting the instrument's manifold polyphonic possibilities. As customary in a Baroque suite, each movement is based on a dance type. Bach's Suite No. 1 opens with a prelude, and is followed by six dance movements, divided over five sections: an allemande, a courante, a sarabande, two minuets, and a final gigue.

Marin Alsop conducts the Britten-Pears Orchestra in a performance of Maurice Ravel’s ‘Ma mère l'Oye’ (Mother Goose). This performance took place at Snape Maltings Concert Hall, Snape Bridge in the UK in 2017. This five-part orchestral suite was originally as a piano duet in 1910, but the composer orchestrated the work the year after. Ravel originally composed the work as a piano duet for the two children of Polish sculptor Gobeski and dedicated the work for four hands to the children.

This festive concert from the Gethsemanekirche in Berlin marks the 60th anniversary of the RIAS Kammerchor. Under the baton of the new chief conductor Hans-Christoph Rademann, the RIAS Kammerchor and the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin perform famous Motets by Johann Sebastian Bach, interspersed with some fine instrumental works of the composer. Founded in 1948, the choir enjoys today a worldwide reputation as one of the best ensembles of its kind. The choir sings „Der Geist hilft unser Schwachheit auf“, Motet BWV 226, Sinfonia from Cantata BWV 146; „Ich lasse dich nicht, du segnest mich denn“ BWV Anh. 159; Concerto from Cantata BWV 35; „Jesu, meine Freude“ BWV 227 and Sinfonia from Cantata BWV 188.

Soprano Alisa Fedorenko (Russia, 1999) and pianist Evgenii Sergeev (Russia, 1986) perform ‘Mandoline’ and ‘À Clymène’ from Gabriel Fauré’s Cinq melodies “de Venise”, Op. 58; ‘Lied der Delphine’ from Franz Schubert’s Zwei Szenen aus dem Schauspiel ‘Lacrimas’, D. 857; ‘Son’ (A dream) from Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Six Romances, Op. 38; ‘Elfenlied’ from Hugo Wolf’s Mörike-Lieder; ‘Staccato’ from Rodion Shchedrin’s Three solfege exercises; and Bart Visman’s Vermeer’s Gold, during the semi-finals of the International Vocal Competition 2021 – Lied Duo. This performance was recorded at Het Noordbrabants Museum in ’s-Hertogenbosch, the Netherlands.

This episode presents the Brandenburg Concertos by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750). Musical excerpts played by the Freiburger Barockorchester conducted by Gottfried von der Goltz. Bach's six Brandenburg Concertos rank among the undisputed favorites of all baroque fans. They have become a firm fixture in music education and an integral part of our international musical heritage. So what's their secret? The internationally acclaimed pianist and Bach expert Robert Levin provides an answer.

Regarded as one of the finest interpreters of Romantic repertoire, Francesco Attesti (*1975) gave his first recital at age 11 and by the time he was 23, had earned the highest honours in piano from Florence’s Conservatorio Luigi Cherubini. In this recording of his 2016 Deeply Mozart concert tour, Attesti performs Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s piano concertos KV 449 and KV 488 with the Italian OIDA Orchestra and conductor Paolo Belloli.

In a 2019 performance from the Muziekgebouw in Eindhoven, Hartmut Haenchen conducts the philharmonie zuidnederland for this performance of Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 7. The German-born conductor, who became a Dutch citizen through naturalisation, was chief conductor at the Dutch National Opera, the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Netherlands Chamber Orchestra before he was finally knighted for his services to the Dutch music landscape. The majestic opening theme of the first movement of Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 7 foreshadows a momentous work, lasting over 20 minutes. The doubt and turmoil felt throughout the Adagio, the second movement, are supposedly Bruckner's response to the news of the death of his idol, Richard Wagner. Bruckner's use of Wagner tubas and double bass tubas creates an even more solemn and grandiose air within the Adagio. Trumpet signals refer to crowing cockerels as they interrupt the grim and clamorous Scherzo. In the Finale, Bruckner employs a persistent rhythmic pulse that starts softly yet builds up towards the explosive final bars.