“Aggressive, nasty and violent. That’s us: Estonians.” This is Anu Tali´s warning on her first meeting with the Munich Chamber Orchestra. For her debut, the Estonian conductor has put together a very Baltic programme: Peteris Vasks´ violin concerto…

He has performed in 3,400 performances in over 130 roles, and conducted upwards of 450 performances; is General Director of both the Washington National and Los Angeles Operas. In opera terms you just can’t climb any higher than Plácido Domingo. Now…

Not since Paganini had there been such a magician on the violin. We see never-seen-before vintage filmed performance clips and home movies of Jascha Heifetz and learn that he was the first truly modern violin virtuoso, the man about whom Itzhak…

Mahler: "Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen" is based on Mahler’s 9th Symphony. In the four parts of this film, renowned conductor Riccardo Chailly and Mahler’s internationally acclaimed biographer, Henry-Louis de la Grange, analyse the four…

Waltz, a revolutionary thing? Historically, it was the first dance having couples clasping each other, men and women hugging, whirling to the rhythm of its music to the point of giddiness and rapture. A dance with a triple time rhythm both simple and…

The story of Caffé Taci, downtown Manhattan: the craziest place in the opera universe, with diamond dealers, losers, up-and-coming singers, opera stars like René Pape, an-85-year-old Russian pianist, aficionados, agents and bohemians. Life is a big…

In the fifties, Pierre Henry provoked a scandal by inventing Musique Concrète with Pierre Schaeffer. Music was no longer written with notes on a score for instrumentalists but was based on sounds and noises from our environment., collected, edited…

Movies are the resolution of a conflict between light and shadows. Light reveals truth and shadows obscure it, with a broad base of tonality in between. These six Bach sonatas have been recorded in one of Germany’s most beautiful Baroque halls in…

There’s no question about it - this man is annoyed. His violin bow swooshes through the air like a saber. Again and again, the final bar of the famous E Major Partita for Solo Violin fills the empty baroque church in Lockenhaus. Gidon Kremer has…

Testing Mozart is a 60 minute film about the "Mozart Effect", the power of Mozart's music to fight disease and increase the mental ability of its listeners. It is common knowledge that cows give more milk and tomatoes grow bigger when played Mozart…