Shostakovich Violin Concerto No. 1 and Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5

Shostakovich Violin Concerto No. 1 and Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5 concert. Performed 2019 with Andris Nelsons conducting the Gewandhausorchester at the Gewandhaus zu Leipzig. Features violinist Baiba Skride. Directed for TV by Ute Feudel; produced by Paul Smaczny. Released 2020, disc has 5.1 dts-HD Master Audio sound. Grade: NA

Buy on Amazon

What's New

Here's news about high-definition video disc ("HDVD") recordings of opera, ballet, classical music, plays, fine-art documentaries, and paintings. In the journal below are independent (and hard-to-find critical) reports on hundreds of HDVDs. Pick the best titles for your excelsisphere.

Feb 25. We have just completed one of our most ambitious reviews: Einstein on the Beach opera, the surreal 4 and 1/2 hour cult legend. Kudos, encomiums, and accolades to Opus Arte for giving us this authoritative and weirdly fascinating recording, which we grade A+. Absorbing and learning Einstein is uniquely challenging. We try to help out by providing aids not included in the keepcase materials: an accurate libretto and a list of segments in the opera with correct Opus Arte time stamps. Good luck!

We have some other good grades with an A for the recent Met The Pearl Fishers (Les pêcheurs de perles) and a B- for an earlier The Pearl Fishers from Naples. Also, we recently gave an A- for the new Don Quixote from the Vienna State Ballet.