This production of Richard Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde” was recorded during the Deutsche Oper Berlin’s great tour to Japan in 1993. Directed by Götz Friedrich and conducted by Jiří Kout, this interpretation of the adulterous love between the Cornish knight Tristan and the Irish princess Isolde was a great success. Wagner’s composition of “Tristan und Isolde” was inspired by his love affair with Mathilde Wesendonck and the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer.

"Bernstein stamps his outsize personality on every bar and regularly has you convinced it is Mahler's own" (Gramophone). Filmed on tour at Berlin's Philharmonie, this account of the valedictory Ninth Symphony is an intense interpretation, expressing Bernstein's conviction that modern man had at last caught up with the message encoded in Mahler's last completed work. Having made his famous 1966 studio recording of "Das Lied vin der Erde" in Vienna, Bernstein re-recorded this in Israel with the same searing subjectivity. René Kollo draws on the voice of a great Wagner tenor, while Christa Ludwig, the greatest exponent of the contralto songs at the time, is unbearably poignant in the final movement's fusion of elation and sadness.

The double title of the opera ''Tannhäuser oder der Sängerkrieg auf der Wartburg'', which had its grand premiere on 19 October 1845 under Wagner''s direction in the Hoftheater in Dresden, is already an indication of how Wagner''s work unites two circles of material whose tradition stems from separate sources. The figure of the minnesinger is an historical fact and his episodes are documented with the ''Tannhäuserlied'' as far back as 1520. In a musical sense, the contrast between diatonicism and chromaticism is symbolic of two different worlds.

Imagine that ten of the world's most well-known highly regarded filmmakers were given a free hand to make real any vision. Aria is that history-making film. Sexy, violent, thought-provoking and funny, here is the movie critics raved about, audiences flocked to see, and no one could stop talking about. Includes Bridget Fonda's electrifying film debut, a revealing and breathtaking performance from Elizabeth Hurley, and Theresa Russell as the trigger-happy King Zog of Albania.

“A performance simply crackling with excitement from the Wiener Staatsoper in 1978, conducted by Leonard Bernstein and featuring sublime performances from Gundula Janowitz as Leonore, René Kollo as Florestan, and Lucia Popp as Marzelline. The celebrated quartet, Mir ist so wunderbar, is nothing short of exquisite.” (James Longstaffe, Presto Classical)

In one of Johann Strauss' waltzes, a dream operetta couple of the 70s returns: Ingeborg Hallstein and Rene Kollo. Wiener Blut, filmed in 1971, is a thoroughly Viennese production whose strengths guarantee unadulterated operetta enjoyment: Beautiful voices, natural acting, more committed to the film than the opera stage and a cast of operetta stars even in supporting roles: Among others, Dagmar Koller, Ferry Gruber and the unforgettable Viennese original Fritz Muliar can be seen and heard.

This DVD of Ariadne is a 1978 film based on Filippo Sanjust’s Vienna State Opera production. The bustling Prologue is set in the backstage area of the mogul’s palace and the 18th century costumes fit neatly. In the opera proper, the stage is transformed into a very stagey desert island with an improbable set of stairs leading to the heroine’s cave, the action spilling over into the theatre’s side boxes at times. While there’s nothing particularly imaginative about the production, it never distracts from the main event–the music. Strauss was profligate in his melodic gifts, his ability to make a reduced orchestra sound big, and his wonderful obsession with the female voice, which yields many glorious moments in the opera. Lavish casting helps.

Filmed live in Baden-Baden by the veteran director Brian Large, Renée Fleming makes her debut in the role of Ariadne together with fellow key Strauss interpreters Sophie Koch and Christian Thielemann, following on from their Rosenkavalier triumph. Thielemann conducts the Staatskapelle Dresden, the orchestra to whom Strauss dedicated his Alpine Symphony and which premiered Feuersnot, Salome, Elektra, Der Rosenkavalier and Daphne. Fleming's voice might have been made for Ariadne and she achieved a great personal triumph in this production: “The chief glory of the evening was hearing Renée Fleming, the Straussian soprano par excellence, making her role debut as Ariadne… As the possessor of what is, possibly, the most beautiful soprano voice in the world, she put her vocal treasures in the service of an empathic, nuanced interpretation of the role. From the creamy top, through a rich, warm middle, to the bewitching, darker colours of her lower register, Fleming poured her magnificent sound into Strauss’s enchanting melodic arcs, animating the sadness, vulnerability, and desire of the bereft princess…” Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung