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Maestro for the Screen

Conductor: Karajan, Herbert von

Television Director: Wubbolt, Georg

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Playing Time: 00:52:02

Catalogue Number: CM9203

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Herbert von Karajan was the only major orchestral conductor to create film – and later video productions – at his own expense. "I am actually born too early," he said, well aware that video's possibilities were still in their infancy. Georg Wubbolt did interviews with Karajan's team: his director of photography, his cutter, his secretary, his producer and musicians of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. This documentary includes outstanding performance material from the Unitel and Telemondial library, as well as unreleased digitally remastered excerpts from the legendary RBB (SFB) and ORF archive. We see Karajan talking about this subject in talk shows and television. It underlines Karajan's appearance as a real Maestro for the Screen from a side unknown to most people, introduced by his closest collaborators.

The film is constructed chronologically. It starts with the very first concert productions in 1957 at NHK in Japan, followed by the impressive cooperation with director Henri-Georges Clouzot in 1965 and ends with Karajan's own film company Telemondial. The Silvesterkonzert 1988 at the Philharmonie in Berlin marks the end of the great era, long before music video entered the entertainment industry.