Deutsche Welle Festival Concerts

Series produced by DW - Deutsche Welle

Caption: DWFC host Cristina Burack, Credit: (c) Ayse Tasci/DW
Image by: (c) Ayse Tasci/DW 
DWFC host Cristina Burack 

Deutsche Welle Festival Concerts

DW: SERIES with live recordings of world-class performances from Germany.

The new season, which starts in October 2023, presents concerts from renowned German classical music festivals.

Broadcast rights allow PRX subscriber stations to use any or all of the programs in the series that have been already been published, or subscribe to the series to receive the files automatically each week.

DW Radio and PRX will release a new season of Deutsche Welle Festival Concerts – classical music made in Germany – in October 2023. Our host, Cristina Burack, will take you through the country's best classical music festivals for exciting, moving and diverse performances, with music ranging from the Baroque to the 21st century. The season's 13 episodes will visit such major musical events as the Bach Festival, Beethoven Festival, Mozart Festival and Bayreuth Festival. In addition, you'll hear directly from musicians, conductors and festival directors as they share exclusive behind-the-scenes insight into the pieces and performances.
The episodes will be released from October 2023 to December 2023. Each one lasts one hour and 58 minutes. The series offers ideal flexibility, as you can broadcast the entire season, creating a regular listening experience, or use episodes individually as needed.
In 2023, the city of Leipzig celebrated "300 years of Bach in Leipzig." In 1723, the famous composer Johann Sebastian Bach came to the Saxon city to take up the position of Thomaskantor, or music director, which he held until his death in 1750. He wrote many beautiful cantatas during his first year in the position. Today, the pieces are sung by choirs all over the world. These cantatas were the central attraction at the 2023 Bach Festival. In this season of DW Festival Concerts, we present the festival's opening concert, which features the St. Thomas Boys choir performing some of these beloved first-year cantatas. The selection includes favorites of renowned early music conductors Ton Koopman and Philippe Herreweghe.
We also bring you a French evening from the Rheingau Festival that includes works by Hector Berlioz, while the concert from the Mozart Festival in Würzburg is all about the Mozart and his idols, including Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach. The Bayreuth Festival episode delivers highlights from a new production of "Parsifal," Richard Wagner's last opera. Listeners will be treated to the unique sound of the Bayreuth Festival Theater, which was designed by Wagner himself.
The chamber music festival "Spannungen" ("Tensions"), in Heimbach, offers up intimate and moving music from Mozart to Ravel as part of a tribute to the festival's late founder.
Our season also includes multiple concerts from the Beethoven Festival in Bonn, the composer's birthplace. Conductor Paavo Järvi opens the multiweek event leading the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich in Dvořák's Symphony No. 9 ("From the New World") and his Cello Concerto op. 104, with the passionate Russian cellist Anastasia Kobekina as the soloist. Also on the program is Arthur Honegger's "Pacific 231." Another exiting episode features famous mandolin player Avi Avital and the New York string quartet Brooklyn Rider playing a selection of chamber music spanning some 300 years!
As long as the broadcasting rights remain available, you can also air programs from our 2022 season. These include a Mozart Festival concert featuring the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra and pianist Seong-Jin Cho performing Mozart's Piano Concerto in A Major. Or there's the concert from the 2022 Bach Festival that illuminated the similarities and differences between JS Bach's music and that of his son Carl Philipp Emanuel, who was widely popular in his time, even more so than his father! The new organist of the famous St. Thomas Church, Johannes Lang, also presented a delightfully varied selection of preludes, fugues and partitas by JS Bach and numerous other relatives. Episodes presenting Bach's St. John Passion and St. Mathew Passion are additionally available.
At the 2022 Beethoven Festival, the Budapest Festival Orchestra performed Beethoven's Symphony No. 3 ("Eroica") under the direction of Iván Fischer. German-American violinist Augustin Hadelich gave an expressive and emotional performance of Beethoven's Violin Concerto, while soprano Anna Prohaska delighted audiences with arias from Mozart's opera "The Marriage of Figaro."
Stations may subscribe to the full series via PRX SubAuto or download individual episodes.
The full list of all 13 episodes for the new season is available now.
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DW Radio and PRX will release a new season of Deutsche Welle Festival Concerts – classical music made in Germany – in October 2023. Our host, Cristina Burack, will take you through the country's best classical music festivals for exciting, moving and diverse performances, with music ranging from the Baroque to the 21st century. The season's 13 episodes will visit such major musical events as the Bach Festival, Beethoven Festival, Mozart Festival and Bayreuth Festival. In addition, you'll hear directly from musicians, conductors and festival directors as they share exclusive behind-the-scenes insight into the pieces and performances.The episodes will be released from October 2023 to December 2023. Each one lasts one hour and 58 minutes. The series offers ideal flexibility, as you can... Show full description


Additional Files

55 Pieces

Order by: Newest First | Oldest First
Caption: Augustin Hadelich
Too different, too innovative: That's what Beethoven's contemporaries thought of his now famous violin concerto! Violinist Augustin Hadelich gives ...

  • Added: Nov 09, 2022
  • Length: 01:57:58
Caption: Alexander Melnikov
Are you melancholic, sanguine, phlegmatic or choleric? No matter your temperament, there's something for you in this 2022 Beethoven Festival concer...

  • Added: Nov 02, 2022
  • Length: 01:57:58
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It's an absolute thrill for any Bach fan to hear his St. Matthew Passion in the place he premiered it: the St. Thomas Church in Leipzig. And this i...

  • Added: Oct 27, 2022
  • Length: 01:57:59
Caption: Collegium Marianum
Who isn't awed by the crashing of waves, or calmed by the babbling of a brook? Composers have been inspired by the sound of water for centuries, tr...

  • Added: Oct 19, 2022
  • Length: 01:57:57
Piece image
Nature, love, fantasy worlds – people longed for these things during the Romantic era. Composers were no exception, and two of them were the focus ...

  • Added: Oct 13, 2022
  • Length: 01:57:58
Caption: Conductor Ivan Fischer
All people are heroes of their own stories, and music can tell their tales. This idea inspired the 2022 Beethoven Festival's opening concert. The B...

  • Added: Oct 05, 2022
  • Length: 01:57:58
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Like father, like son – or so the saying goes. But how true does this hold for Johann Sebastian Bach and his son Carl Philipp Emanuel? The opening ...

  • Added: Sep 28, 2022
  • Length: 01:57:58
Caption: Daniel Barenboim conducting
In times of war, music can provide a much-needed glimmer of hope – and this special DWFC episode dedicated to Ukraine does just that. It features p...

  • Added: Jun 23, 2022
  • Length: 01:57:59
Caption: The Mahler Chamber Orchestra
Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 2 is a force to reckon with. Known as the "Resurrection" symphony, it features both tender moments and apocalyptic one...

  • Added: Dec 22, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58
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Have you ever wished for a time machine so you could travel back in time? Maybe catch the premiere of a Beethoven Symphony? Then this concert from ...

  • Added: Dec 15, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:59
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Take a walk in the country – with Beethoven! His Symphony No. 6, known as the "Pastoral" Symphony, was his attempt to express not nature itself but...

  • Added: Dec 08, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58
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Is it possible to tell what's arguably the most told story in the world – the life and works of Jesus Christ – in a fresh, new way? The 2021 Bach F...

  • Added: Dec 02, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:57
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An evening of intimate chamber music in a hydroelectric power plant? You bet! Known as the "Bayreuth of Chamber Music", the Heimbach music festival...

  • Added: Nov 24, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58
Caption: Stage Design Flying Dutchman
A deal with the devil, a vow till death and surging melodies make Richard Wagner's opera "The Flying Dutchman" pure drama – and this gripping perfo...

  • Added: Nov 17, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58
Piece image
He was a rebel and a trickster, a thief with lofty intent, a champion of mankind against the gods: Prometheus. The Greek titan who stole fire from ...

  • Added: Nov 11, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58
Piece image
What makes a symphony legendary? Is it a certain level of grandeur or complexity? Or can just the initial ideas of a never completed work be just a...

  • Added: Nov 04, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58
Caption: Conductor Philippe Herreweghe
What do you turn to when a loss is so great that you can't put your grief into words? For many people, it's music – but such music isn't strictly s...

  • Added: Oct 27, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58
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It's possibly the most iconic piece of music in the entire Western classical repertoire: Beethoven's Symphony No. 9, with its soaring "Ode to Joy" ...

  • Added: Oct 21, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58
Caption: Eberbach Abbey
Tempest-tossed voyages over billowing seas, sparse winter landscapes shimmering with snow – it's all but impossible not to see such dramatic scenes...

  • Added: Oct 13, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:59
Caption: Conductor Kyrill Petrenko
How do you capture star-crossed lovers in music? And can a symphony pull a composer out of an emotional rut? The Berlin Philharmonic under chief co...

  • Added: Oct 06, 2021
  • Length: 01:57:58