Great Composers - Beethoven and Wagner (2005)

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Great Composers - Beethoven and Wagner (2005)

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This programme presents the lives and works of Beethoven & Wagner, as featured in the BBC series 'Great Composers'. It examines the backgrounds, influences and relationships that make these composers part of the very fabric of the history of western music. Each composer's life and work is presented through extensive performance sequences, and through interviews and comment from some of today's greatest artists and most respected authorities.

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Great Composers - Beethoven and Wagner (2005)

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The second volume of the BBC's excellent Great Composers series consists of two hour-long episodes devoted to Beethoven and Wagner respectively. The format in both cases is that of a standard "life and works" biography, but what makes these episodes so attractive is the high quality of the visual material and the engrossing nature of the insights offered from the contributors. For example, it's fascinating to hear the lead violin of the Lindsay Quartet discuss the personal significance of a certain Beethoven phrase just after Charles Rosen has drawn a parallel with the composer's use of form and the speeches of Robespierre. If this makes the whole project sound as wholesome and dull as dry muesli, everyone also seems alive to the human idiosyncrasies of the subjects: we learn, among other things, that the utterly humourless Cosima Wagner used to keep her husband's eyelashes and carry them around with her in a bag. The musical excerpts are both performed–by the Berlin State Opera Orchestra and other groups–and filmed with panache. Kenneth Branagh narrates. All in all, a good introduction to both composers.–Warwick Thompson

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Great Composers - Beethoven and Wagner (2005)

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