1970 was the 200th anniversary of Ludwig van Beethoven’s birth and, to mark the occasion, Daniel Barenboim and Christopher Nupen collaborated on a thirteen-part series about the man and his music. Close friends at the time, Barenboim as artist and…

A television film about a single work, Modest Mussorgski’s “Pictures at an Exhibition”. Written as a tribute to a lost friend, Victor Alexandrovich Hartmann, it is a strange and moving masterpiece which has become Mussorgski’s most popular work. It…

Lord Yehudi Menuhin, relaxing at his home in the Greek isles, tells the story of his wonderful career on the eve of his 80th birthday. A wealth of rare archival material illustrates this highly informative and entertaining profile of the world's…

Art Blakey, Dexter Gordon, Ron Carter, Herbie Hancock, Thelonious Monk... these names are synonymous with the great Jazz Age. But how many people know Alfred Lion and Frank Wolff, to whom we owe the recorded memory of our Jazz legends? Two German…

Sviatoslav Richter's talent was such that Prokofiev's 9th Sonata was dedicated to him, he performed at Stalin's funeral with Oistrakh and Rostropovich and accompanied Schwarzkopf and Fischer-Dieskau. This profile, illustrated by rare and previously…

In the historic Weimar Herder Church Sir John Eliot Gardiner finds the perfect setting for his recording of the Bach Christmas Oratorio. Against the backdrop of the dramatic altar and Lucas Granach paintings, the Monteverdi Choir and the English…

Herbert Blomstedt appears with the Gewandhaus Orchestra for the last time as the Gewandhaus Music Director in this recording. After seven successful years in Leipzig, the maestro performs a work in the Thomas Church that is especially dear to him…

HEREAFTER is a retrospective of the life and work of Gould, seen from today’s point of view. Based a synthesis of all the documents existing on Gould, whether of a musical or of a literary and intellectual nature, this film strives to deal with the…

In retrospect, the solo version of Strawinsky’s Sacre du Printemps can be interpreted as a bleak, oppressive dance about his own life. The ballet is one of the late works by Uwe Scholz, one of the most important choreographers of the twentieth…

El Sistema is a network of children’s and youth orchestras, music centres and workshops in Venezuela, in which more than 250,000 children and young people are currently learning to play an instrument. It was set up over thirty years ago by José…