Best movies like Elgar: The Man Behind the Mask

Overture to The Merry Wives of Windsor [also known as The Merry Wives of Windsor Overture] is a 1953 American short musical film produced by Johnny Green. The film consists of the MGM Symphony Orchestra playing the Overture to Otto Nicolai's opera The Merry Wives of Windsor, also conducted by Johnny Green. It won an Oscar in 1954 for Best Short Subject, One-Reel.

Jamboree adheres to the usual formula of late-1950s rock&roll films: A plethora of musical numbers linked together by the wispiest of plotlines. Kay Medford heads the cast as manipulative showbiz agent Grace Shaw. Hoping to land pop singer Pete Porter (Paul Carr), Grace connives to break up Pete's romance with female vocalist Honey Wynn (Freda Holloway). But who cares? The audience came to see such musical faves as Fats Domino, Count Basie, Jerry Lee Lewis, Jodie Sands, Ron Coby, Slim Whitman, Carl Perkins, Frankie Avalon, Charlie Gracie and the Four Coins. As a promotional tie-in, Jamboree also features appearances by 21 of North America's top rock-and-roll deejays.

Lyla and Louis, a singer and a musician, fall in love, but are soon compelled to separate. Lyla is forced to give up her newborn but unknown to her, he grows up to become a musical genius.

Bugs conducts the Warner Brothers Symphony in Franz von Suppé's "Morning, Noon, and Night in Vienna" while reacting to a bothersome fly.

A young Irishwoman comes to the United States to live and work with her mother as a cleaning lady at Carnegie Hall. She becomes attached to the place as the people she meets there gradually shape her life. The film also includes a variety of performances from some of the foremost musical artists of the times: conductors Bruno Walter & Leopold Stokowski, solists Arthur Rubinstein & Jascha Haifetz, singers Lily Pons & Jan Peerce and bandleader Vaughn Monroe among many others.

A fictionalised exploration of Beethoven's life in his final days working on his Ninth Symphony. It is 1824. Beethoven is racing to finish his new symphony. However, it has been years since his last success and he is plagued by deafness, loneliness and personal trauma. A copyist is urgently needed to help the composer. A fictional character is introduced in the form of a young conservatory student and aspiring composer named Anna Holtz. The mercurial Beethoven is skeptical that a woman might become involved in his masterpiece but slowly comes to trust in Anna's assistance and in the end becomes quite fond of her. By the time the piece is performed, her presence in his life is an absolute necessity. Her deep understanding of his work is such that she even corrects mistakes he has made, while her passionate personality opens a door into his private world.

A win on the football pools in postwar Britain changes lives. A happy family is turned into an unhappy argumentative lot until it is discovered the coupon apparently didn't get posted. A mild-mannered clerk worries about how to tell his overbearing boss he is quitting. A double-bass player finds life without the orchestra lacks something. The lure of the big money even turns some people into criminals, as when a coupon checker is tempted by his night-club singer girlfriend to cheat the company. Written by Jeremy Perkins

British filmmaker Simon Cellan Jones directs the BBC drama Eroica, starring Ian Hart as Ludwig van Beethoven. Shot on digital video, this TV film depicts the first performance of Beethoven's Third Symphony, June 9th, 1804, in Vienna, Austria. Prince Lobkowitz (Jack Davenport) has invited friends to listen to Beethoven conduct his new symphony for the first time. Among the aristocratic attendees are Count Dietrichstein (Tim Pigott-Smith), Countess Brunsvik (Claire Skinner), and composer Josef Haydn (Frank Finlay). The actual musical score is performed by the Orchestre Revolutionaire et Romantique, under the direction of John Eliot Gardiner.

A disfigured musical genius, hidden away in the Paris Opera House, terrorises the opera company for the unwitting benefit of a young protégée whom he trains and loves. The 25th anniversary of the first public performance of Phantom of the Opera was celebrated with a grand performance at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

The incredible tale of Mozart's Prague years.

When composer George Harvey Bone wakes with no memory of the previous night and a bloody knife in his pocket, he worries that he has committed a crime. On the advice of Dr. Middleton, Bone agrees to relax, going to a music performance by singer Netta Longdon. Riveted by Netta, Bone agrees to write songs for her rather than his own concerto. However, Bone soon grows jealous of Netta and worries about controlling himself during his spells.

Hymn of the Nations, originally titled Arturo Toscanini: Hymn of the Nations, is a 1944 film directed by Alexander Hammid, which features the "Inno delle nazioni," a patriotic work for tenor soloist, chorus, and orchestra, composed by Italian opera composer Giuseppe Verdi in the early 1860s. (For this musical work, Verdi utilized the national anthems of several European nations.) In December 1943, Arturo Toscanini filmed a performance of this music for inclusion in an Office of War Information documentary about the role of Italian-Americans in aiding the Allies during World War II. Toscanini added a bridge passage to include arrangements of "The Star-Spangled Banner" for the United States and "The Internationale" for the Soviet Union and the Italian partisans. Joining Toscanini in the filmed performance in NBC Studio 8-H, were tenor Jan Peerce, the Westminster Choir, and the NBC Symphony Orchestra. The film also included the overture to Verdi's opera La Forza del Destino.

A chronicle of the life of infamous classical composer Ludwig van Beethoven and his painful struggle with hearing loss. Following Beethoven's death in 1827, his assistant, Schindler, searches for an elusive woman referred to in the composer's love letters as "immortal beloved." As Schindler solves the mystery, a series of flashbacks reveal Beethoven's transformation from passionate young man to troubled musical genius.

The son of a wealthy Maine family shocks his relatives by announcing he wants to pursue a career in music.

Renowned musician Lydia Tár is days away from recording the symphony that will elevate her career. However, Lydia's elaborate facade begins to unravel, revealing dirty secrets and the corrosive nature of power.

Composer Robert Schumann struggles to compose his symphonies while his loving wife Clara offers her support. Also helping the Schumanns is their lifelong friend, composer Johannes Brahms.

On the keyboard, the young hands fly rapidly and the melody rises. For the child, nothing is easier; he hears the sounds in his head. These hands belong to 6 years old André Mathieu. He won his audiences and fired up concerts halls in London, New York, Paris and around the world. Adulated, hailed, praised, the child prodigy seemed to have everything to succeed. From the top of his vertiginous successes, to depths of torment, the life of the "Little Canadian Mozart" blends into his music. A romantic and passionate composer wishing for happiness, his story is nevertheless played on tragic notes.

The portrait of Russian composer Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky focuses on his failed love affair.

In December of 1944, Lionel Evans, an internationally renowned American conductor, is on a USO tour with his 70-piece symphony orchestra in newly-liberated Belgium. While fleeing from a German counterattack, Evans and his orchestra members are captured by a Panzer division and taken to an old chateau in Luxembourg. Despite orders to execute every prisoner, General Schiller, an avid music lover, commands Evans to give a private concert for him.

A chronological look at the life and career of jazz musician, composer, and performer Dave Brubeck (1920-2012 ), presented through contemporary interviews, archival footage of interviews and performances, and commentary by family, fellow musicians, and aficionados. Emphases include his mother's influence, his wife's invention of college tours, his skill as an accompanist, the great quartet (with Desmond, Morello, and Wright), his ability to find musical ideas everywhere, his orchestral compositions, his religious conversion, and his unflagging sweet nature.

A television documentary produced for British Television directed by Peter Greenaway about Phillip Glass that is a recording of a performance of the Phillip Glass Ensemble in 1983 with interviews that go in depth of his style and music theory of his signature minimal sound.

A beautiful cabaret dancer inspires composer Rimsky-Korsakov.

Following the success of the 1979 show and the financial benefits accruing to Amnesty from the spin-off movie, TV special and record albums – Cleese, Lewis and Walker planned the next show to be a more spectacular event. Cleese focused on broadening the comedic talent to be presented at the show. In addition to the Amnesty show stalwarts drawn from the Oxbridge/Monty Python/Beyond The Fringe orbit, he invited newcomers such as Rowan Atkinson’s colleagues from the BBC TV show Not the Nine O'Clock News including Pamela Stephenson and Griff Rhys Jones; comedian Victoria Wood and regional comic Jasper Carrott. Lewis secured a return appearance by Billy Connolly and a debut appearance by "alternative" comedian Alexei Sayle who Lewis had recently discovered and was managing. Building on the success of Pete Townshend's 1979 appearance Lewis recruited other rock musicians to perform at the 1981 show including Sting, Phil Collins, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Donovan and Bob Geldof.

American conductor John Meredith and his manager, Hank Higgins, go to Russia shortly before the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. Meredith falls in love with beautiful Soviet pianist Nadya Stepanova while they travel throughout the country on a 40-city tour. Along the way, they see happy, healthy, smiling, free Soviet citizens, blissfully living the Communist dream. This bliss is destroyed by the German invasion.

In the spring of 1913, Parisian businessman Gabriel Astruc opens a new theater on the Champs Elysées. The first performance is the premiere of Igor Stravinsky's 'The Rite of Spring', danced by the Ballet Russes. The rehearsal process is extremely fraught: the orchestra dislike Stravinsky's harsh, atonal music; the dancers dislike the 'ugly' choreography of Vaslav Nijinsky. The volatile, bisexual Nijinsky is in a strained relationship with the much older Sergei Diaghilev, the Ballet Russes' charismatic but manipulative impresario. Public expectation is extremely high after Nijinsky's success in 'L'apres-midi d'un faune'. Finally, 'The Rite of Spring' premieres to a gossip-loving, febrile, fashion-conscious Parisian audience sharply divided as to its merits.

A definitive portrait of Princess Diana, marking what would have been her 60th birthday, piecing together her incredible journey from being a teenage Pimlico nursery assistant to finding her voice as the Princess of Wales.

A feature film about Benjamin Britten, released as part of the 100 year celebrations of his birth. Britten is the most performed British composer worldwide. This film premiered at Gresham's School, which he attended, and focuses on how his life-long pacifism influenced his life and music. Written and directed by Tony Britten (In Love With Alama Cogan), narrated by John Hurt and with a superb cast of young people, including many supporting roles taken by students of Gresham's School, the film weaves dramatisation with a documentary narrative.

This autobiographical film about the most important and influential composer of the 20th century includes documents, photographs and film never seen publicly before. Stravinsky's three surviving children talk about their father and there are contributions from the late Madame Vera Stravinsky, his music associate Robert Craft, Marie Rambert, Balanchine, Nadia Boulanger and many friends. Included in the film are important performances: Les Noces has never before been heard in this, its original form, and the choreography of Petrushka was specially recreated for the film by the Bolshoi and was not seen in this form since 1911. Finally, there is priceless film of Stravinsky himself in this unique film.

The life of prolific Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev is portrayed through biographical, on-location flashbacks from his birth place intermingled with live concert performances from the historical Kirov (Mariinsky) Symphony Orchestra, St.Petersburg, conducted by internationally acclaimed maestro Valeriy Gergiev. These unique musical sequences give the dramatized episodes from Prokofiev's life a time-transcending significance and actuality in todays ever-changing Russia.

Tribute pays musical homage to India on several songs; Greek-born composer and keyboardist Yanni describes the album as a tribute to the builders of the Taj and the Forbidden City, as well as to the people of India and China. Yanni's ethereal keyboard work is backed by orchestra, vocalists, a choir, and various world instruments including didgeridoo, duduk, charango, and bamboo saxophone.

Fifty years after his death, this musical and psychological portrait of Ralph Vaughan Williams explores the passions that drove a giant of 20th-century English music.

Ken Russell revisits the life of Elgar, with musical background provided by the composer's works.

Brilliant portrait of the composer's elusive life with a huge array of his greatest works. "This sumptuously beautiful documentary... combines rare film of the composer, interviews with people who knew him, and spectacular performances of his music... Rich production values, exhaustive examination, adoring in its representations of his work." - The Montreal Gazette

To mark the centenary of Benjamin Britten's birth, Britten’s Endgame explores the composer's creativity in the face of death. Those closest to him watched anxiously as he raced to complete his final opera, Death in Venice, in defiance of medical advice, tackling an edgy subject with many resonances in his own life. His eventual heart operation left him incapacitated and prematurely old and frail, yet somehow he rediscovered his creative urge to produce two late masterpieces. This is a rich and poignant film about Britten’s final years, and the impact of what Peter Pears called 'an evil opera'.

This documentary follows composer and conductor Igor Stavinsky at his home in California, in London, and in Hamburg where he conducts an orchestra rehearsal. Includes conversations with a variety of friends and musical collaborators. Includes footage of Stravinsky and Balanchine discussing the Variations (in memoriam Aldous Huxley) and rehearsing their ballet Apollo with Suzanne Farrell.

U2 bring their stadium-filling rock to Abbey Road Studios to perform exclusive versions of classics like With or Without You, Beautiful Day and One, alongside new music from their latest album Songs of Experience, accompanied by a live orchestra and choir.

BBC documentary. Witness John Williams composing the legendary score for The Empire Strikes Back and conducting the London Symphony Orchestra.

Children and childhood fascinated Benjamin Britten throughout his life and inspired some of his greatest music. John Bridcut's compelling film sheds light on the composer's own inner child throiugh interviews with several of Britten's former companions and muses.

After her boyfriend ends their relationship, the dreamself of a heartbroken woman floats through the air over an industrial wasteland singing ballads of love.

Six-year-old "Mike" goes to live with her pregnant older sister, Babs, who plays string bass in José Iturbi's orchestra. And the orchestra is rapidly turning completely female, what with the draft. As the orchestra travels around the country, Babs' fellow orchestra members intercept and hide her War Office telegram to protect the baby.

Giselle is the quintessential Romantic ballet. Its title role, one of the most technically demanding and emotionally challenging in the classical repertory, is here danced by Alina Cojocaru, partnered by Johan Kobborg as Count Albrecht. This tale of the transcendental power of love over death is evocatively portrayed through Peter Wright’s sensitive staging and John Macfarlane’s designs, which beautifully contrast the human and supernatural worlds – mastered from a High Definition recording and true surround sound. Conductor : Boris Gruzin Orchestra : The Orchestra of the Royal Opera House

A romantic opera in three acts with music and libretto by Richard Wagner, performed by the Orchestra of the Teatro di San Carlo. The original title, Tannhauser und der Sangerkrieg auf Wartburg, reveals the real nature of the opera, born by a fusion of two traditional sagas and dedicated to the dualism of spirituality and sensuality and the possibility of redemption through love. Composed between 1843 and 1845, Tannhauser has a tormented musical theme, made up of constant variations. It debuted in Dresden in 1845 when Wagner was just over 30.

A celebration of the 20th anniversary of Metallica’s groundbreaking S&M concerts and album recorded with the San Francisco Symphony as legendary conductor Michael Tilson Thomas leads a portion of the show, kicking off his final season in San Francisco. Recorded live on September 6th and 8th.

Perhaps the most popular ballet video ever released, this version of Tchaikovsky's beloved work stars one of the most famous classical dance partnerships of all time, Rudolf Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn. Nureyev choreographed this production for the Vienna State Opera Ballet. Two icons of 20th-century dance in magnificent form. Ballet authority John Lanchbery, former music director of the Sadler's Wells and Royal Ballet companies, as well as of American Ballet Theatre and Australian Ballet, conducts the Vienna Symphony Orchestra in Tchaikovsky's enchanting score.

Chart-topping jazz trumpeter Chris Botti and special guests performed two star-studded concerts at the historic Boston Symphony Hall with Keith Lockhart and the Boston Pops on September 18 and 19, 2008. Special guests include Josh Groban, Yo-Yo Me, John Mayer, Katharine McPhee, Lucia Micarelli, Sting and Steven Tyler.

Jonas Kaufmann and Anna Caterina Antonacci bring rare erotic intensity to the drama of Don José and Carmen in this darkly passionate reading of one of the most popular operas. Kaufmann uses his burnished tenor and smouldering good looks to portray the man undone by Carmen's love. As the object of his desire, Antonacci gives a physical and compelling performance.

Live performance, new production season 1984-5. BBC 2 Television relay on 30 March 1985 of performance of February 11.

This telecast offers a rare opportunity to see the legendary Joan Sutherland in the role that first catapulted her to international stardom. She drove audiences wild by the way her opulent voice caressed the music’s long phrases and sprinted effortlessly through the fiendish runs, trills, embellishments and stratospheric high notes. One of the glories of the operatic world, her portrayal of Donizetti’s hapless heroine is a multifaceted and moving characterization. The incomparable tenor Alfredo Kraus is Edgardo, the man Lucia loves but cannot have. (Performance taped November 13, 1982. Broadcasted September 28, 1983.)

A selection of performances by Manchester-based acts culled from the BBC archives.

Neagle stars a Frances Baring, a socialite widow attempting to keep her late husband's symphony orchestra going. Reluctantly she enlists the help of a young pop singer (Frankie Vaughan) who has fallen for Baring's daughter Joanna, played by a young Janette Scott.