The marvellous Portuguese pianist Maria João Pires was joined by Pierre Boulez and the Berlin Philharmonic for the European Concert 2003. Since 1991, when the Berlin Philharmonic gave their first European Concert, this annual musical summit in…

Dutch organist and harpsichordist Ton Koopman is one of the most distinguished Bach interpreters of our time. On this DVD, he is featured interpreting Johann Sebastian Bach’s greatest organ works, including the popular Toccata in D minor and the…

Jazz met Classical music when singer Dee Dee Bridgewater and cellist Mischa Maisky joined forces with the Gewandhaus Orchestra under conductor Andrey Boreyko in Leipzig’s historical market square in a summer night of music in 2003. World-famous…

The two films on this DVD combine some of the most demanding chamber works ever written. Recorded at the atmospheric Academy of Sciences in Budapest, the Keller Quartet plays a version of Bach’s unfinished masterpiece The Art of the Fugue for string…

Ton Koopman, a leading authority on Baroque music, gathered his favourite orchestra and eminent Baroque singers for a concert focusing on the Magnificat, the traditional prayer said by the Virgin Mary after hearing that she would bear God’s son. Bach…

The Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester was founded in 1986 at the initiative of Claudio Abbado and has since become the world’s best youth orchestra. Named after the great composer, the programme is marked by the special relationship between the maestro…

Epic staging of Aida with special lighting effects, pyrotechnics and monumental elements: horses, elephants and more than 400 participants are set against the backdrop of the wild-romantic quarry of St. Margarethen. The impressive and breathtaking…

Dutch conductor Sigiswald Kuijken presents the two Ascension Oratorios by father and son Bach. Johann Sebastian Bach’s work was first performed in Leipzig on Ascension Day in 1735. The text mixes biblical and poetic material. Recorded live at the…

Claudio Abbado has realised a dream with his new Lucerne Festival Orchestra. The orchestra, an exclusive ensemble of handpicked orchestral musicians, has set new standards in the field of classical music with exceptional soloists such as violinist…

In his position as the king’s composer, Jean Baptiste Lully (1632-1687) created the opera Persée for Louis XIV. The opera was considered the crowning achievement of 17th century French music theatre and was widely recognized as Lully’s greatest work…