DVD Videos

Few conductors have made a greater contribution to our present day understanding of Bruckner than Günter Wand (1912-2002). His readings of the composer‘s symphonies invariably concentrated on their texture and hence, their spirit. During the great final phase of his career, documented here, Wand devoted himself increasingly to Bruckner‘s works and his interpretations became more and more free, revealing both heartfelt emotion and musical intelligence. He developed trademark fidelity towards Bruckner, which led to insightful readings of his works. Wherever possible Wand returned to the versions representing most clearly the composer‘s intentions - be it the „urtext“ or scrupulously restored versions.

In the television recording of Bruckner’s popular Symphony No.4, Günter Wand and his inimitable style of conducting are brought back to life in a particularly impressive way. The films of his concerts at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, from 1987 onwards, can truly be regarded as Günter Wand‘s legacy to the NDR Sinfonieorchester, „his“ orchestra for almost 20 years, on which he has left a mark like no other.

Sound Format: PCM STEREO

DVD Format: DVD 5, NTSC

Picture Format: 4:3

FSK: 0

Running Time: 87 mins

Christian Thielemann is widely regarded as the leading Brucknerian of our age, and his performances with the Munich Philharmonic, of which he has been music director since 2004, enjoy cult status all over the world. This DVD features a world première of Bruckner´s two most popular works, the Symphonies No. 4 and No. 7, which he interprets as sublime cathedrals of late Romantic music, impressing his listeners in ways that few other conductors can do.

Video director Agnes Méth

First on DVD: Thielemann´s fantastic performances of Bruckner´s two most popular works.

Thielemann is a maestro internationally known and admired above all as a specialist of Romantic music and a highly acclaimed Bayreuth Wagner Ring conductor.

“Under Christian Thielemann's guidance, the Munich Philharmonic sounds terrific.” New York Times 2007

“Christian Thielemann is the most gifted German conductor." Financial Times

Running Time 145 minutes

Picture 16:9, color

Sound PCM Stereo, DTS 5.1

Packaging NTSC: Amaray 1 DVD

Booklet English, German, French

Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival 2000

Few conductors have made a greater contribution to our presentday understanding of Bruckner than Günter Wand (1912-2002). His readings of the composer‘s symphonies invariably concentrated on their texture and hence, their spirit. During the great final phase of his career, documented here, Wand devoted himself increasingly to Bruckner‘s works and his interpretations became more and more free, revealing both heartfelt emotion and musical intelligence. He developed trademark fidelity towards Bruckner, which led to insightful readings of his works. Wherever possible Wand returned to the versions representing most clearly the composer‘s intentions - be it the „urtext“ or scrupulously restored versions. In the television recording of Bruckner’s Symphony No.8, Günter Wand and his inimitable style of conducting are brought back to life in a particularly impressive way.

The films of his concerts at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, from 1987 onwards, can truly be regarded as Günter Wand‘s legacy to the NDR Sinfonieorchester, "his" orchestra for almost 20 years, on which he has left a mark like no other.

Sound Format: PCM STEREO

Picture Format: 16:9

DVD Format: DVD 9, NTSC

Running Time: 96 mins

FSK: 0

Host: Habakuk Traber

A completely new way of experiencing and enjoying the great works of music from the Baroque to the Modern Period – thanks to a new series of audio-visual concert guides, Masterpieces of Classical Music. Each release includes extensive documentation and a complete performance of the work or works in question.

Famous masterpieces from the standard repertoire of the greatest international orchestras are brought closer to the viewer through first class concert broadcasts (Berliner Philharmoniker, Wiener Philharmoniker, Gewandhaus Orchester…) in a timely visual style.

Each part includes 27 mins introductory feature + full concert performance!

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. He utterly rejected it, almost driving Bruckner to suicide. But instead he set to work thoroughly revising the symphony and completed a new version in 1890. Habakuk Traber explains this masterpiece by introducing Bruckner’s personality and his unique style of composing.

Picture format DVD: NTSC 16:9

Sounds formats DVD: PCM Stereo, DD 5.1, DTS 5.1

Region code: 0

Booklet notes: English, German, French

Running time: 30 mins (documentary) + 80 mins (performance)

FSK: 0

For a full sixty minutes Celibidache rehearses Bruckner’s Ninth – a key work for the composer, who did not complete any more compositions after he finished the Adagio. It is also a key work for Celibidache, who towards the end of his life frequently returned to working on Bruckner’s late symphonies, performing them in guest appearances all over the world with the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra. In no other documentary film about Celibidache does one experience with such immediacy the moment of music being created.

“I breathe with you, and that is the secret of phrasing: where you breathe and how you breathe.” “We always think that there’s an interpretation. An interpretation of what? How can you interpret a landscape? If you have to go from Plön to Eutin, are there interpretations? Or do you have to come up with the lakes, the forests, the pathways and so on? You can’t interpret them. You can experience them – and that’s the difference!” Sergiu Celibidache

Sound Format: PCM Stereo

Picture Format: 16:9

DVD Format: DVD 5, NTSC

Subtitle Languages: DE, GB, FR, ES, IT, JP

Running Time: 60 mins

FSK: 0

The programme of the concert that Günter Wand (1912-2002) conducted to open the 2001 Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival – the last time he was to do so – was a private profession of his faith in Schubert and Bruckner. Both composers and both works were particularly close to his heart. Neither symphony was finished, yet, for all their stylistic differences, the movements that were completed create the impression of fully rounded works and do so, moreover, in startlingly similar ways. The result is what might be termed two “finished unfinished symphonies”. Time and again towards the end of his life, Günter Wand combined these two works in a single programme, his interpretation of them confirming their affinities in the finest manner imaginable.

The films of his concerts at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival, from 1987 onwards, can truly be regarded as Günter Wand‘s legacy to the NDR Sinfonieorchester, „his“ orchestra for almost 20 years, on which he has left a mark like no other.

Sound Format: PCM Stereo

Picture Format: 4:3

DVD Format: DVD 9, NTSC

Running Time: 100 mins

FSK: 0

With its majestic themes soaring upwards like gothic pillars and its brilliant chorales and fanfares glowing like stained – glass windows, Anton Bruckner’s Symphony No. 8 is the most monumental of his orchestral works, a cathedral in sound that grows out of pianissimo murmurs. Coming after the triumphs celebrated by the composer’s Seventh Symphony and Te Deum, the Eighth was considered by Bruckner as the artistic climax of his career.

Cleveland‘s Severance Hall is the venue for this performance. This hall, an eclectic yet elegant mix of Art Deco, Art Nouveau, Classicism, Egyptian Revival and Modernism was inaugurated in 1931 and is still hailed today as one of the world‘s most beautiful concert halls. The Cleveland Orchestra, founded in 1918, began its ascent to the upper ranks of the world‘s ensembles after it moved to Severance Hall in 1931.

BONUS: Pre-concert talk with Dee Perry and Franz Welser-Möst

Sound Format: PCM STEREO, DD 5.1, DTS 5.1

Picture Format: 16:9

DVD Format: DVD 9, NTSC

Language: GB (bonus)

Running Time: 95 mins + 17 mins (bonus)

FSK: 0

Maestro Sergiu Celibidache (1912–1996) was one of the most uncompromising figures in the music world, demanding three times as much rehearsal time as other conductors and with an ardent dislike of making recordings because he feared they misrepresented his musical intentions. He agreed to set aside his long-held antipathy to recordings of his work to enable the cameras to capture this concert from the Philharmonie in Munich, in which he conducts the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra.

“Sergiu Celibidache demands unheard-of amounts of orchestral rehearsal time and obviously knows what he wants to do with it. He has an extraordinary ear for orchestral detail. He has a highly developed ... technique for maintaining spacious tempos. He understands, as Herbert von Karajan and Carlos Kleiber and a few other conductors do, that it is advantageous to play softly a lot of the time if you want a wide palette of expression and tonal beauty. He has a charismatic hold over his orchestra and his admirers.” The New York Times

Sound Format: PCM Stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1

Picture Format: 4:3

DVD Format: DVD 9, NTSC

Running Time: 90 mins

FSK: 0

When it comes to shaping a musical event for the ears and the eyes, the monumental majesty of Anton Bruckner’s (1824–1896) symphonies and the exhilarating vibrancy of St. Florian’s monastery in Austria are a perfect match – especially when they are captured on film so thrillingly by such an eminent director as Brian Large.

The Fourth Symphony marks a major milestone in Bruckner’s attempt to establish a symphonic design suitable to sustain his innovative musical thought. Not surprisingly, the score was subjected to extensive revisions. The Fourth, in fact, represents the most convoluted revision history of all his symphonies – and this for a composer for whom variant editions of a work, often involving substantial changes, became the norm. The result is that the identification of the “authentic” final score that should be performed is a matter of ongoing debate for many of his symphonies – in particular the Fourth.

Franz Welser-Möst, the Music Director of The Cleveland Orchestra and General Music Director of the Vienna State Opera, is an acknowledged Bruckner specialist who has developed a passion for the composer’s Fourth Symphony – called the “Romantic” by its creator – in its infrequently played first edition (1888/89).

The Cleveland Orchestra, called the most European of America’s prestige formations, has been setting new standards in Bruckner interpretation for several years now through the “expertise” of Franz Welser-Möst, who “elicits a grandiose interpretation from his technically unsurpassable ensemble … It was an excellent concert … as anticipated.” (Austria’s leading daily, Die Presse).

Sound Format: PCM Stereo, DD 5.0

Picture Format: 16:9

Format: DVD 9 / NTSC

Running Time: 74 mins

FSK: 0

Recorded live at Philharmonie Berlin on 21 June 2010.

The Süddeutsche Zeitung summed up this highly acclaimed performance of Bruckner's monumental Fifth Symphony by saying: “Both Bruckner’s belief in God, as it majestically wells up out of the chorale of the Fifth, and his deeply tragic world view, collide with one another in Barenboim’s interpretation”. The operatic experience of the conductor was almost tangible, revealing the “sheer dramatic instrumental battle between Bruckner’s God and the Devil – between heaven and hell – without betraying Bruckner’s unerring sense of striking proportions.” The release of this “contrapuntal masterpiece” (as Bruckner, not without pride, referred to this work) is part of Daniel Barenboim’s Bruckner cycle with the renowned Staatskapelle Berlin.

Picture Format DVD: NTSC 16:9

Sound Formats DVD: PCM Stereo

Dolby Digital 5.1

DTS 5.1

Region Code: 0 (worldwide)

Running Time: 76:49 min

Disc Format DVD: DVD-9