One of the world's finest and most-respected conductors, seventy-year-old Claudio Abbado is legendary in stature, having held the post of musical director with La Scala in Milan from 1968 to 1986, with the Vienna Opera from 1986 to 1991, and the…

How did artists survive in the Soviet Union? How tricky did they have to be in the face of authorities? What kind of danger and difficulties did they have to fear? Gennadi Rozhdestvensky talks about authorities, watchdogs and the political system in…

Country music does not enjoy a good reputation - at least not in Europe. Country is barely within the boundaries of good taste. Country ‒ that’s botoxed women and flabby men with guitars. Just one look at the American Country Music Awards (ACM) and…

Autumn 2020. An international cast arrives in Amsterdam for the rehearsals of Mozart's “Le nozze di Figaro” by Dutch National Opera. Hundreds of people have been working on it for three years and the performances are sold out. The young up-and-coming…

A Christopher Nupen film with Daniil Trifonov –– pianist, composer, Russian and a magician at the keyboard. The astonishing musical gifts of Daniil Trifonov have to be seen and heard to be believed. How many have won both the Rubinstein and…

Arriving in La Havana, once we pass through the other side of the tropical mirror, we penetrate into a world where logical has no currency anymore. Havana is the city of the company Danza Contemporánea de Cuba. Here, the temperaments of the dancers…

The dramatic story of an inspired violinist, of a loyal man whose self-imposed silence eloquently betrayed unspoken private suffering. This extensive profile features interviews with David Oistrakh's longtime friends and fellow musicians: Yehudi…

The six Brandenburg Concertos by Johann Sebastian Bach 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…

Ludwig van Beethoven’s ninth and last symphony is considered one of the highlights of symphonic music. Through the use of song, Beethoven questions the effect of purely instrumental music, and he exerted a sustained influence on all generations of…

Anton Bruckner's Symphony No. 8 in C minor is the last Symphony the composer completed. When Bruckner sent it in 1897 to Hermann Levi, the conductor who had lead his 7th to great success, he did not understand this very different work at all and…