What a strange idea Mondonville had! Based on a cruel fable by La Fontaine with a tragic ending, he wrote a charming opera libretto with a happy ending, and composed a delightful pastoral. In the prologue, Dame Clémence Isaure, the mythical founder…

The “Bolero”, originally composed as a ballet, is Maurice Ravel's most successful work at all. The world famous melody of the “Bolero” has been featured in popular music, motion pictures and even video games. Pianist and writer Paul Roberts vividly…

Turn back time and dreams to the black and white cinema universe where divas like Marilyn Monroe, Judy Garland, Audrey Hepburn and many more with their delicate voices and expressive faces let us keep on dreaming while listening to their…

On Wednesday, October 16th, Dmitri Hvorostovsky's birthday, the Festival officially opens with a performance of Giuseppe Verdi's Messa da Requiem.

Compelling love duets, escalating conflicts and arias bursting with virtuosity and emotion. In his three Tudor Queens operas, bel canto master Gaetano Donizetti composed at the top of his game. In this concert, an international cast takes you on an…

Fado is so much more than a musical genre - it is an attitude to life! With her art, Gisela João puts her own icing on the cake of the unique tradition of Fado: Modern and at the same time idiosyncratic, she interprets the Portuguese musical style…

Friar Alessandro is a modest monk living in the hilltop monastery of Assisi and an award winning recording artist. He is a charming and spiritual young man with a gentle tenor voice whose musical message of hope, peace and brotherly love is…

Orchestras once played Bach as well as Bruckner. Only specialised ensembles showed that note and performance signs have changed their meaning quite a bit over the centuries. So far, so theoretical: in practice, Handel's "Il Trionfo" awaits us, a…

This Vivaldi concert was recorded on the occasion of Julien Chauvin‘s CD release „Il Teatro“. The concert is an opportunity to confront the theatricality of Vivaldi‘s instrumental music with the virtuosity of his operatic arias. Always seeking to…

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…