Merian Wien

Miklós Rózsa and Bernard Herrmann were two composers leading a double life: Educated as serious classical composers who worked for the concert hall, they found their greatest success and life-long careers in the medium of motion pictures – more specifically, in Hollywood. Both men composed some of the most distinguished film scores of all time: Double Indemnity, Ivanhoe, Ben-Hur, King of Kings, El Cid (Rózsa); Citizen Kane, Vertigo, Psycho, and Taxi Driver (Herrmann).

Filmed in the architectural splendour of Graz's Gothic-Baroque cathedral, leading Bach authority Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducts the famed Tölz Boys Choir and his Vienna Concentus Musicus, playing on period instruments, in the most dramatic of all Passion settings. "In this performance we have attempted to realize Bach's wishes in the most authentic manner possible" (Nikolaus Harnoncourt). "A unique occasion" (Kurier).

The importance of Georg Christoph Wagenseil (1715-1777) in the development of the classical symphony cannot be underestimated, and his concertos were also significant in the formation of the style of early Viennese classicism. As its chief representative, Wagenseil unites Italian, French and German stylistic elements in his works, as was typical of the 'mixed style' of the early 18th century. Moreover, he is considered one of the perfectors of the gallant-sentimental stylistic epoch which became so essential for the formation of classicism in 18th-century music history.

Bach's Brandenburg Concertos, named after their dedicatee the Margrave Christian Ludwig von Brandenburg, have been part of Nikolaus Harnoncourt's permanent repertoire ever since he founded his Concentus musicus ensemble. The ensemble has recorded them and played them on their tours throughout the world.

The fairy Melinde has for ten years been estranged from her husband, Count Arnulf of Montabaur, as a result of his ambitions for their son: he wished to place the boy on the throne of neighbouring Brabant by usurping his niece, Princess Ida. Melinde has hidden their son from his father to protect him from his bad influence. Although Arnulf believes
she has killed him, the young man is living disguised as a minstrel, Palmerin, who owns a remarkable magic harp.

Filmed and directed by Jean-Pierre Ponnelle in the unique interiors of Vicenza's Teatro Olimpico in 1986, this DVD offers an intimate glimpse of Mozart's first major opera, written when the precocious composer was just fourteen. Nikolaus Harnoncourt leads a stellar cast in portraying the inner circle of the Roman Empire's fiercest enemy: Mithridates, king of Pontus.