First Encounters with La Scala When La Scala reopened in May 1946 after the destruction of the Second World War, Arturo Toscanini conducted a concert that quickly became a symbol of cultural reconstruction in Europe. In the years that followed, the Milan opera house entered a new international phase —…
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Motherhood appears surprisingly often in classical music — just rarely in direct form. Composers often approach the subject through lullabies, prayers, childhood memories, or music connected to comfort and protection. Brahms, for example, added the most personal movement of his German Requiem shortly after his mother died in 1865. And…
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What does “home” mean? In English, the word usually refers to a private space—the place where someone lives. The German word Heimat works differently. It can describe a region, a country, or a shared cultural environment. This difference is not accidental. Linguists often point out that languages develop words for…
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This week’s edition looks at Herbert von Karajan’s collaborations with female artists at very different stages of their careers. Working in a period when major orchestras remained almost entirely male, Karajan relied on female soloists to shape many of his most distinctive projects. The four recordings selected here trace this…
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This week’s playlist traces the stages of Verdi’s development—from the fire of his early operas to the psychological depth of his late works. With Ernani, Il trovatore, Un ballo in maschera and Otello, all under the baton of Herbert von Karajan, we follow a composer in constant transformation. Otello marks…
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Karajan told Richard Osborne about the repertoire at his first engagement in Ulm: “I was always grateful to Verdi...”
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When Karajan conducted “Aida” for the first time in Vienna in 1951, it was not at the State Opera. As with “Carmen” three years later, he caused a stir...
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Verdi’s „Messa da Requiem“ is the greatest work of 19th-century sacred Italian music and his most important work apart from the operas...
Read MoreHere you can download the full curriculum vitae of Herbert von Karajan!