"Actor: Edith Mathis"

• Mahler - Symphonies Nos. 4, 5 and 6 (Bernstein, Wiener Po) | DVD | (24/10/2005) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £21.99

  Gustav Mahler (1860-1911)Symphonies Nos. 4 5 and 6Mathis Wiener PhilharmonikerDirected by Humphrey Burton

• Mozart: Le Nozze di Figaro -- 1966 Salzburg Festival/Bohm | DVD | (19/09/2003) from £7.53   |  Saving you £23.72 (378.31%)   |  RRP £29.99

  A performance of Mozart's Le Nozze Di Figaro featured at the Salzburg Festival in 1966. Karl Bohm conducts the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra.

• Little Drummer Boy - An Essay On Gustav Mahler By And With Leonard Bernstein | DVD | (16/07/2007) from £N/A   |  Saving you £N/A (N/A%)   |  RRP £16.99

  This television essay from 1985 was written by Leonard Bernstein to commemorate the 125th anniversary of Gustav Mahler's birth. The essay recorded in Israel Vienna and later in London is punctuated by biographical interludes and illustrated by musical examples drawn from the cycle of Mahler's works recorded by Leonard Bernstein. Bernstein talks plays and conducts various orchestras (Israel Philharmonic Orchestra London Philharmonic Orchestra Wiener Philharmoniker) and soloists (Janet Baker Christa Ludwig Edith Mathis Lucia Popp Walton Groenroos) in performances spanning 17 years. Leonard Bernstein also examines the roots of Gustav Mahler's inspiration. This DVD features music from the nine symphonies The Song of the Earth and the Wunderhorn Cycle.

• The Creation | DVD | (15/05/2000) from £6.61   |  Saving you £13.38 (202.42%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Haydn's oratorio Die Schöpfung ("The Creation") recounts Genesis via Milton's Paradise Lost, translated into German and reworked into the finished libretto by the Baron van Swieten. It is an intensely felt masterpiece, Haydn later saying, "I was never so pious as during the time when I was working on The Creation: I fell to my knees daily and asked God to give me the strength for a favourable completion of the work." The music alternates thrilling choral writing with moving solo parts, and bass Rene Pape and soprano Edith Mathis are especially fine. This DVD release presents a 1992 performance originally shot for video in an unnamed but beautiful and ornate Baroque location. The notes record that at the public premiere in Vienna in 1799, a small book containing van Swisten's libretto was given to each member of the audience "So that ever'body unnerstands what the music wanted t'say." It is ironic that this release contains neither the libretto nor subtitles. This is a musical drama, and the text is vitally important for more than superficial appreciation, such that those unfamiliar with the work may find greater reward in John Eliot Gardiner's 1997 CD version. On the DVD: The disc contains a clean, sharp 4:3 ratio transfer from the original video programme with minimal evidence of grain. The sound is stereo PCM and generally good, though in some of the more full-blooded passages the recording of the choir is a little constricted and even harsh. There are no extra features of any kind, though being Region 0 the disc will play in any DVD machine. --Gary S. Dalkin

• Menotti - Help Help The Globolinks | DVD | (29/01/2007) from £11.89   |  Saving you £13.10 (110.18%)   |  RRP £24.99

  Globolinks - An opera for children and all those still young at heart!This historical studio production (1969) was filmed after the world premiere from The Hamburg State Opera in 1968.

• Mozart: Requiem In D Minor KV 626 | DVD | (03/09/2005) from £21.58   |  Saving you £-1.59 (-8.00%)   |  RRP £19.99

  Mozart's last work The Requiem Mass in D Minor K626 receives a strong performance from the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra And Chorus under Mozart specialist Colin Davis in a classic recording made in 1984.Popular legend has it that the Requiem was commissioned by a mysterious stranger fuelling Mozart's obsession that the piece was his own Mass. However the probable truth is much less dark that one Count Walsegg who had a well-known penchant for commissioning works which he then attempted to pass of as his own commissioned it upon the death of his wife. Mozart died is 1791 before completing the piece. It was later completed by one of his students Franz Sussmayer at the request of Mozart's wife Constanze.