The Cleveland Orchestra is the "aristocrat among American orchestras" (The Telegraph), and the ensemble's music director Franz Welser-Most, leads them with verve and precision. These three discs from Belvedere (DVD and Blu-ray) feature six and a half hours of music, presenting a cycle of all the major orchestral works of Johannes Brahms. Included are the complete Symphonies and Piano Concertos, the Violin Concerto, the Tragic Overture, the Academic Festival Overture, and the Haydn Variations. Soloists include violinist Julia Fischer and pianist Yefim Bronfman.

The Cleveland Orchestra is the "aristocrat among American orchestras" (The Telegraph), and the ensemble's music director Franz Welser-Most, leads them with verve and precision. These three discs from Belvedere (DVD and Blu-ray) feature six and a half hours of music, presenting a cycle of all the major orchestral works of Johannes Brahms. Included are the complete Symphonies and Piano Concertos, the Violin Concerto, the Tragic Overture, the Academic Festival Overture, and the Haydn Variations. Soloists include violinist Julia Fischer and pianist Yefim Bronfman.

As in previous years, the Vienna Philharmonic’s 2024 New Year’s Concert has been released by Sony Classical in both audio and video formats. Under the baton of Christian Thielemann no fewer than nine of the works from the foot-tapping world of the waltz and polka are featured for the first time on the programme of what remains the most popular event in the world of classical music.

Older chamber music fans who lament the demise of the trio formed by pianist Eugene Istomin, violinist Isaac Stern, and cellist Leonard Rose will rejoice to hear of this two-disc EMI DVD set featuring videotaped recordings by the esteemed American trio of Beethoven's complete works in the genre: the three Trios from Opus 1, the two from Opus 70, and the one and only Opus 97, plus the transcription of Opus 11. They will, of course, already have the players' stereo studio recordings of the works released on Columbia in the '60s, but unless they were watching French television in 1970, they probably missed these performances filmed live in the studio in Paris. Istomin, Stern, and Rose here have the same distinctive blend of strong individuality and sympathetic ensemble, of blunt aggression and warm tenderness, of powerful drama and melting lyricism that was the hallmark of the group's studio performances, but with the extra excitement and spontaneity of live performances.

Antonio Pappano and the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden are presenting a symphonic work with particular relevance for Dresden: Rachmaninoff‘s Symphony No. 2, which was written during the composer‘s years at the Saxon residency. The Petersburg premiere of Rachmaninoff’s 1st Symphony became a fiasco. This rejection, by the public and the critics, plunged the composer into a creative crisis. In 1906, Rachmaninoff moved to Dresden and composed his successful and highly dramatic Second Symphony. Included on this DVD are the full concert performance with Maestro Pappano and Sächsische Staatskapelle and the documentary Sergei Rachmaninoff in Dresden. It is the first time that Sächsische Staatskapelle performed Rachmaninoff’s Symphony No 2 under the baton of Antonio Pappano. The documentary includes extensive archive material, photos, scores and posters from Dresden in the years between 1906 and 1920.

In this performance of Handel's best-loved oratorio, conductor Christopher Hogwood returns to the original performance traditions. The choruses are sung by boy trebles and male altos, tenors and basses, and member of the Choir of Westminster Abbey. The soloists improvise embellishments in the arias and, in certain cases, join in the singing of the choruses - just as they would have done 240 years ago. In addition, Members of the Academy all play instruments of the period or accurate modern copies.

Rafael Kubelik was one of the 20th century's most brilliant and charismatic conductors, yet under-appreciated because of his reluctance to embrace the "star" system. Here he is seen working with the great orchestras of Berlin, Vienna and Amsterdam, and featured in a bonus biographical documentary acclaimed for "stylish camera-work and a counterpoint of image, word and music reflecting Kubelik's spontaneity, exuberance, trust in emotion, and ability, even in tailcoat, to retain his warmth and humanity" (Süddeutsche Zeitung).

The Summer Night Concert will be performed this year on June 7. It is an annual open-air event, which has been held since 2004 in the magical setting of Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna/Austria. The illustrious conductors who have previously led the orchestra at this event are Georges Prêtre, Daniel Barenboim, Franz Welser-Möst, Lorin Maazel, Christoph Eschenbach, Zubin Mehta, Semyon Bychkov, Gustavo Dudamel, Daniel Harding, Yannick Nézet-Séguin and Andris Nelsons.

David McVicar’s spellbinding production of Le nozze di Figaro is set in 1830s post-revolution France, where the inexorable unravelling of an old order has produced acute feelings of loss. In the relationship between Finley’s suave, dashingly self-absorbed Count and Röschmann’s passionately dignified Countess, which lies at the tragic heart of the opera, the sexy ease between a feisty Figaro (Erwin Schrott) and a sassy Susanna (Miah Persson) is starkly absent, the tenacious spark between Marcellina (Graciela Araya) and Bartolo (Jonathan Veira) suggesting what might be rekindled.

The Deutsche Oper in Berlin had hardly opened on 24th September 1961 before it started preparing to celebrate its 50th anniversary. How was that possible? Had it entered into some sort of time warp? That might indeed have been possible for a theatre that in the past had devoted itself to Richard Wagner’s works. But there was a simpler explanation: the Deutsche Oper Berlin had, in fact, originally opened on 7 November 1912 under the title of Deutsches Opernhaus.

Covent Garden’s 2003 production of The Magic Flute , designed by John F. Macfarlane, directed by David McVicar, and conducted by Sir Colin Davis, is magnificent from a strictly musical standpoint. More than that, it’s vastly entertaining. The comedic elements of the story integrate far more comfortably than is often the case with Schikaneder’s high-minded (if vague) theme of a quest for enlightenment, particularly in the second act. Visually, the production is a feast, yet it doesn’t distract from the music.

Mozart's genius in setting to music Da Ponte's comic play of love, infidelity and forgiveness marks Così fan tutte as one of the great works of art from the Age of Enlightenment. Nicholas Hytner's beautiful production for the Glyndebourne Festival in 2006, with its sure touch and theatrical know-how, lives up to its promise to be 'shockingly traditional', while Iván Fischer teases artful performances from an outstanding international cast of convincing young lovers.

Obsessive in gambling and in love, the soldier Hermann is the protagonist of Tchaikovsky’s Pique Dame, based on a story by Pushkin. He is smitten with the aristocratic Lisa and fixated on learning the winning secret of ‘the three cards’ from her grandmother, the Countess, played by iconic contralto Ewa Podles. This opulent production from Barcelona’s Liceu captures St Petersburg in the era of Catherine the Great, while the house’s Music Director Michael Boden conducts a large and impressive cast.

The vulnerable young woman at the heart of Janacek's breakthrough opera is a signature role for the English soprano Amanda Roocroft. Here, in Stéphane Braunschweig's clear but deeply affecting production, she is partnered by the Slovak tenor Miroslav Dvorsky, as the man through whom she finds redemption, love and hope. The complex figure of the Kostelnicka becomes both tormentor and tormented in this fearless interpretation by the great dramatic soprano Deborah Polaski.

Mozarts beliebte Oper "Die Zauberflöte" unter der Leitung von Wolfgang Sawallisch - jetzt erstmals auf DVD erhältlich! 1983 live aufgenommen, zeigt diese Produktion aus der Bayerischen Staatsoper eine der bekanntesten Opern überhaupt - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozarts "Die Zauberflöte" in der Inszenierung von August Everding. Edita Gruberova als begehrteste Königin der Nacht der Welt, Francisco Ariza als einer der berühmtesten Taminos unserer Zeit, machen neben anderen Weltstars der Oper (Kurt Moll, Lucia Popp, Wolfgang Brendel, u.a.) diese Produktion zu einem Fest für Augen und Ohren. Eingerahmt und kongenial geleitet wird dieses Ensemble von Wolfgang Sawallisch. "Zeigt das Ernsthafte - vergesst aber den Humor nicht" - mit dieser Einstellung beweist Everding in dieser einzigartigen Inszenierung sein Genie auf dem Gebiet der Opernregie. Diese Zauberflöte ist ein absolutes Muss für alle Opernfans.