In this sober and moody documentary, director Anders Østergaard explores the life - and death - of Swedish wonder kid jazz pianist Jan Johansson through a rain-soaked windshield.
Wanda Horowitz reminisces about her husband, the great pianist Vladimir Horowitz, with clips from his television appearances.
An intimate documentary portrait of world-class improvisational and traditional pianist Mike Garson as he tours, performs, and teaches.
Follows the artist over two years as he explores his „life after Beethoven“, as he searches for his next challenge, his identity as an artist.
“Symphonic Sketches” tells the story of one classical music concert performed by the Denver Philharmonic Orchestra. Musicians from diverse racial backgrounds connect to the repertoire in unique ways and stage an unforgettable performance.
The exiled Austro-German musician and composer Artur Schnabel was a giant of his time, but in Germany today he is nearly forgotten. Pianist and Schnabel devotee Markus Pawlik (in collaboration with baritone Dietrich Henschel and the Szymanowski String Quartet) brings Artur Schnabel's greatest compositions back to Berlin with a filmed commemorative concert. Along the way, Pawlik visits the places, landscapes, and history that shaped Schnabel's life and music. "Artur Schnabel: No Place of Exile" rediscovers an essential artist displaced by the catastrophe of the two World Wars and the Holocaust and inspired by the possibilities of modernism.
After more than 60 years, the uncrowned king of 20th century pianists returned to his freedom-torn homeland to perform his swan song in a piano recital. In the mid-1980s, a breathtaking concert took place in Moscow that many still recall with emotion. The great Ukrainian-American pianist Vladimir Horowitz performed there for the first time in more than half a century. At that time, the border between East and West was impassable. The Cold War was in full swing. The two superpowers, the US and the Soviet Union, considered each other enemies. The race to produce atomic weapons threatened everyone's lives. The legendary pianist Vladimir Horowitz, then eighty-two years old, began one evening discussing with his concert agent Peter Gelb what he dreamed and wished for. One of the things was to look back to Russia.
In his new film, Erwin Wagenhofer is looking for the good and beautiful in this world.
A short documentary about Vince Guaraldi, the composer most well known for his work on several 'Peanuts' animated television specials.
Jazz pianist Mary Lou Williams was a genius ahead of her time. From child prodigy to "Boogie-Woogie Queen" to groundbreaking composer to mentoring some of the greatest musicians of all time, she never ceased to astound those who heard her play. But for a Black woman in the early 1900s, life as a star did not come easy.
A biographical film featuring the music and times of Bill Evans with interviews from Tony Bennett, Jack Dejohnette, Billy Taylor, Paul Motian, Jon Hendricks, Orin Keepnews, Bobby Brookmeyer, Pat Evans and more, including family and friends who knew Bill Evans well.
The documentary follows Chilly Gonzales from his native Canada to late '90s underground Berlin, and via Paris to the world's great philharmonic halls. Diving deep into the dichotomy of Gonzales' stage persona, where self-doubt and megalomania are just two sides of the same coin.
Raimonds Pauls is almost 85 years old, rehearses almost every day and performs at least once a week. What drives him? Not only he is the most popular composer in Latvia: his songs are sung all over the world. "Dāvāja Māriņa" is so popular in Japan that Paul received the Japanese Order of the Rising Sun. In concerts, he collaborates with world stars of Latvian origin - soprano Elīna Garanča, organist Iveta Apkalna, conductor Mariss Jansons. The Latvian Television film crew follows him during the pandemic, realizing that the restrictions and threats of Covid-19 hardly stop the Maestro in the course of his eternal engine. How does he cope with the challenges that time imposes on a person's physical form and the loneliness when most friends have passed away? What is the source of his inexhaustible lifestyle and creative spirit?
The life and times of the mexican pianist Julieta García Rello, as told by her granddaughter.
Atypical dive into the world of a particularly talented artist of today: Alexandre Tharaud. Born of parents who were themselves familiar with the stage, Alexandre combines his passion for the piano and his fertile intranquillity under the eye of an intimate camera. A film conducted in the form of an exploration of intimate moments where the artist is much more in front of himself than the public, a confrontation at once gentle and brutal to his passion, to his unattainable star. Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli – a name that provokes almost a sense of awe and intimidation, even among his pianoplaying peers. It is a name that represents the highest degree of perfection, a quest for beauty that surpasses that of any other piano virtuoso. However Michelangeli also had a reputation for cancelling concerts at short notice and was consequently portrayed in the media as a somewhat neurotic artist. This documentary is the result of a 30-year search that has resulted in unusual interviews with those who knew him, and has also uncovered a wealth of new archive material: We get to experience Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli as he has never been seen before – and more importantly, as he has never been heard before. We also witness the maestro’s struggle back to his former perfection after suffering a devastating heart attack.
Two British children travel to Italy in an attempt to break up their runaway mother's affair with an Italian concert pianist.
A vacuum repairman moonlights as a street musician and hopes for his big break. One day a Czech immigrant, who earns a living selling flowers, approaches him with the news that she is also an aspiring singer-songwriter. The pair decide to collaborate, and the songs that they compose reflect the story of their blossoming love.
London, England, on the eve of World War II. Guinevere Pettigrew, a strict governess who is unable to keep a job, is fired again. Lost in the hostile city, a series of fortunate circumstances lead her to meet Delysia LaFosse, a glamorous and dazzling American jazz singer whose life is a chaos ruled by indecision, a continuous battle between love and fame.
This Royal Albert Hall Concert, presented now on DVD, was also available online through live streaming. It is difficult to remember the last time any concert gave me so much pleasure and insight, and sent my soul soaring to such heights of joy. So many beloved piano pieces, so magnificently performed! Valentina has scaled the heights of technique, knocking off 'impossible' Liszt pieces like a stroll in the park. She melds with the piano with such assured ease that she can milk every piece for musical content and subtlety, reminding us of the great Hoffman, who also loved to play each piece a little differently every time, tapping deeply into the inexhaustible potential of a great composition, perpetually finding fresh ideas and magnificent new interpretations.