“Originally art was made by a minority for a minority. Then it became art by a minority for the majority, and now we are at the beginning of a new era where art is intended by the majority for the majority.” – José Antonio Abreu

Three decades ago, visionary Venezuelan musician and politician José Antonio Abreu founded El Sistema, a national system of music education designed as a model for social improvement. Today, some 265,000 Venezuelan children and young people are involved in choirs and orchestras around the country, and El Sistema is exporting some of the world’s finest musicians.

El Sistema takes us from the barrios of Caracas and Maracay to the concert hall of the Lucerne Festival, following the lives of children who have found the way to a better future through the model of the symphony orchestra.

This lyrical and moving documentary shows us young children and their families in their home environments. They speak of their everyday hopes and fears: of gang warfare and gunfire, drugs and violence, and the dream of a better life through education and music. “To my mind, our social problems all stem from a sense of exclusion”, says Abreu. “If you look at the world, you see that exclusion in some form or other is to blame for the explosion of social problems everywhere. So we have to fight to bring as many people as we can, everyone, if possible, into our wonderful world: the world of music, the world of the orchestra, of singing, of art.”

El Sistema shows how children as young as two are taken from the dangers of life on the street and taught the rudiments of music. In one of hundreds of “núcleos” created within the communities themselves they are provided with instruments, music lessons, social support and the chance to work as part of an ensemble. Six days a week, four hours a day, children come together and make music in a safe and supportive environment.

Given acceptance, encouragement and inspiration, they quickly develop into capable musicians. For some, that means better tools for future study in other fields. Others go on to play in the world’s top orchestras. Gustavo Dudamel, now in demand on the world’s best stages, conducts the flagship Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra in Caracas and talks of his own experience as a child growing up with El Sistema. His is just one of many stories of transformation and hope.

Quirky, exuberant, honest and heart-warming, El Sistema is both an unlikely journey and an exceptional success story. Paul Smaczny and Maria Stodtmeier have created a joyful portrait of the power of music as a positive tool for social change.

The film earned several awards like the “Grand Prix” of the Golden Prague Festival, the “Special Jury Prize” in the category “Feature Length Film Awards” and the “Feature Film Competition Award” in the category “The Ecofilms Team Awards” of the Rodos Ecofilms Festival.

LEONARD BERNSTEIN
Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood

Johannes Brahms

Symphony No. 2 in D major, Op. 73 • Symphony No. 4 in E minor, Op. 98

In anticipation of the upcoming Bernstein 90th birthday celebration, Naxos releases Leonard Bernstein and the Boston Symphony at Tanglewood. Leonard Bernstein came to Tanglewood as a student under Sergei Koussevitzky in the summer of 1940. Two summers later, Bernstein was appointed as the assistant to Maestro Koussevitzky at Tanglewood. Bernstein continued to return to Tanglewood almost every summer for 50 years to teach and conduct. This performance from August of 1972 speaks to Bernstein’s passion for conducting, his love affair with Tanglewood, and his hometown Boston Symphony Orchestra’s fondness for him.

Bernstein remarked of this performance of Brahms Symphonies 2 & 4, “Every time I return to Tanglewood I’m filled with nostalgia, but this summer of 1972 I’ve had a particularly vivid memory of Koussevitzky conducting the Brahms symphonies he loved so deeply.”

A bonus film shows Leonard Bernstein talking about his relationship to Tanglewood, his early career there and of the festival’s very special culture. The DVD also features Bernstein in conversation with his students in the summer of 1972, when the material for this wonderful portrait of Leonard Bernstein was recorded.

BEETHOVEN STRING QUARTETS

Juilliard String Quartet

Op. 18 No. 4 • Op. 59 “Rasumovsky” No. 1 • Op. 13

Now celebrating its 62nd anniversary, the Julliard String Quartet was founded in 1946 to champion the cause of chamber music through pedagogy and public performance. Known for its unprecedented affinity for experimentation, the quartet has won 4 Grammy® Awards and has been String Quartet-in-Residence at the Library of Congress since 1962. Thirty years into its long history, and equipped with founding member Robert Mann on 1st violin, veteran members Earl Carlyss (2nd violin) and Samuel Rhodes (viola), and cellist Joel Krosnick, the ensemble was filmed performing these Beethoven quartets.

This unique documentation of a 1975 concert is performed in an acoustically spectacular former Augustinian Monastery in Bavaria and includes Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 4 in C minor (1799), a stellar example of Beethoven’s early works; the mid-period String Quartet No. 7 in F major, which was completed 7 years later and is regarded as one of Beethoven’s finest chamber works; and finally the last large-scale piece written by the composer, String Quartet No. 14 (Op. 131), which is considered to be one of his greatest works in any the genre.

On February 26, Naxos of America, distributor for EuroArts, releases NOTES INTERDITES: The Red Baton and Gennadi Rozhdestvensky: Conductor or Conjuror? (EuroArts 3073498) by acclaimed filmmaker Bruno Monsaingeon (Glenn Gould Hereafter).
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