Keeping Score: Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 4

Beethoven · Die Symphonien(de)

Kesäillan valssi(fi)

A story built around the music of Oskar Merikanto, tells the love story of the poor musician Lauri Alanko and the daughter of the rich Grahn family Annina. Annina’s family doesn’t approve of the relationship, and the couple’s happiness is also threatened by Lauri’s worsening eye disease.

Nas: Live from the Kennedy Center(en)

Two decades after the album’s critically acclaimed release, hip-hop artist Nas teamed up with the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., to stage a symphonic rendition of “Illmatic,” one of the most revered albums in hip-hop history. Nas: Live From the Kennedy Center captures the energy and nostalgia of this collaborative performance.

Keeping Score: Beethoven's Eroica(en)

Beethoven spent three years composing the Eroica, an intimate journal of his emotional crises and his dramatic emergence as an original master. Michael Tilson Thomas and the musicians of the San Francisco Symphony help you make sense of this voyage into life as it really is.

Beethoven Symphony No. 9(en)

Karajan's very best video Beethoven 9th Symphony, recorded December 31, 1977. The Quartet of vocal soloists and Chorus in IV are superb. This is much better than Karajan's 1968 Berlin Philharmonic Beethoven 9 video (DG), filmed in the Philharmonie with no live audience present.

Mahler: Symphony No. 2 “Resurrection” – Lucerne Festival(de)

“It would be hard to find anything greater, more significant or more moving anywhere in musical life today: total harmony of mind and heart, poetry and outcry, fear and consolation, knowing and feeling,” declared the Berne paper ‘Der Bund’ after this stunning performance of Mahler’s ‘Resurrection’ Symphony in August 2003 by the newly founded Lucerne Festival Orchestra. Claudio Abbado had formed this ensemble from famous instrumentalists, celebrated chamber-musicians and experienced soloists from the world’s best orchestras, and the event was sold out months in advance. The ‘Neue Zürcher Zeitung’ reported: “Once again the applause at the end was unequalled; the immense final chord … broke a tension that had lasted over 90 minutes without relaxing for a moment.”

Lucerne Festival: Mahler: Symphony No. 1; Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No.3(en)

The charismatic and inspiring Claudio Abbado and the mesmerising young pianist Yuja Wang, with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, hold the audience spellbound in this opening concert of the 2009 Lucerne Festival. Prokofiev's popular and vibrant Third Piano Concerto demonstrates the composer's sharp musical wit, and Yuja Wang is a brilliant exponent of the work. Following this, and chiming beautifully with the festival's theme of the relationship between art and nature, Mahler's First Symphony is given an illuminating and rapturously received performance.

Lucerne 2007: Abbado conducts Mahler 3rd Symphony(en)

For this performance of Mahler's Symphony No. 3, recorded live in 2007 at the Congress and Concert Hall Lucerne, Claudio Abbado and the Lucerne Festival Orchestra are joined by the Arnold Schoenberg Chor and the Tölzer Knabenchor. The soloist is Anna Larsson.

Lucerne Festival 2009 - Abbado conducts Mahler No. 4 Rückert Lieder(en)

The charismatic and inspiring Claudio Abbado and the magnificent mezzo-soprano Magdalena Kožená, with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, hold the audience spellbound in this live recording from Lucerne Festival in Summer. Mahler’s five Rückert-Lieder – in a profoundly moving and rapturously received performance – precede Mahler’s sublime and deeply personal Fourth Symphony. This extraordinary work is executed with power, passion and sensitivity, with Magdalena Kožená giving a transcendent rendition of the final movement.

Lucerne Festival: Mahler: Symphony No. 6(en)

Live performance of Gustav Mahler's 'Symphony No.6' at the 2006 Lucerne Festival. Claudio Abbado conducts the Lucerne Festival Orchestra, which includes soloists such as violinist Kolja Blacher, cellist Natalia Gutman and clarinettist Sabine Meyer.

Lucerne Festival: Mahler: Symphony No. 7(en)

Claudio Abbado conducts the Lucerne Festival Orchestra in this performance of Mahler's seventh symphony recorded in 2005.

Mahler: Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2 [Paavo Järvi, Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra](en)

The release of Mahler's Symphonies Nos. 1 + 2 starts the release the complete Mahler cycle with Paavo Jarvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra on DVD and Blu-ray. Each Symphony will have an introduction by Paavo Jarvi.

Dragon Quest IV Symphonic Suite: London Philharmonic Orchestra Live(ja)

Home video featuring The London Philharmonic performing music from Dragon Quest IV: Michibikareshi Monotachi, conducted by composer Koichi Sugiyama.

G. Mahler II. symfónia c mol "Vzkriesenie"(sk)

Yanni: Live at the Acropolis(en)

A concert by contemporary instrumental musician, Yanni, recorded live at the Herodes Atticus Theatre in Athens on 25 Sep 1993.

Lover Divine(de)

A section from the life of composer Franz Schubert as a material for a love story. Also known in English as Gently My Songs Entreat. An English version called Unfinished Symphony would follow in 1934.

Bernstein in Vienna: Beethoven, The Ninth Symphony(en)

To play Beethoven's music is to give oneself over completely to the child-spirit which lived in that grim, awkward, violent man. Without that utter submission it is impossible to play the Adagio of the Ninth. Or, Heaven knows, the first movement. And the Finale? Most of all! It is simply unplayable unless we go all the way with him, as he cries out "Brüder!" - Leonard Bernstein

Leonard Bernstein: Chichester Psalms Symphony No's 1 & 2(en)

Leonard Bernstein performs three of his own compositions with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra at the Philharmonic in Berlin.

Song of Russia(en)

American conductor John Meredith and his manager, Hank Higgins, go to Russia shortly before the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. Meredith falls in love with beautiful Soviet pianist Nadya Stepanova while they travel throughout the country on a 40-city tour. Along the way, they see happy, healthy, smiling, free Soviet citizens, blissfully living the Communist dream. This bliss is destroyed by the German invasion.

Bugs Bunny's Overtures to Disaster(en)

Bugs Bunny conducts an orchestra of all his greatest operatic hits.