1918. As the roar of the First World War cannons is dying out, in Vienna, the heart of Central Europe, a golden age comes to an end. The Austro-Hungarian Empire is beginning to disintegrate. On the night of October 31st, in the bed of his home, Egon Schiele dies, one of the 20 million deaths caused by the Spanish flu. He dies looking at the invisible evil in the face, in the only he can do: painting it. He is 28 years old. Only a few months earlier, the main hall of the Secession building had welcomed his works: 19 oil paintings and 29 drawings. His first successful exhibition, a celebration of a new painting idea that portrays the restlessness and desires of mankind.A few months earlier, his teacher and friend Gustav Klimt had died. From the turn of the century, he had fundamentally changed the feeling of art and founded a new group: the Secession.

After decades of work on Beethoven’s original scores, the Austrian pianist Rudolf Buchbinder offers a definitive interpretation of all of Beethoven’s piano concertos in this series of live recordings of his ecstatically acclaimed performances in the Musikverein in Vienna. Buchbinder conducts the Vienna Philharmonic from the piano and achieves a rare degree of tension and chamber-like concentration. “There is no one else who plays Beethoven with such classical perfection and at such a high level.” Der Kurier, Vienna

On Christmas Eve viewers of ERT1 have the opportunity to watch at 10 pm, the concert of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, sto Concerto Midsummer Night's Schonbrunn 2015, in the unique atmosphere of the gardens of the summer palace of Schonbrunn in Vienna, with background famous Gloriette. Ti Vienna Philharmonic conducted by Zubin Mehta. By adopting this concert in a public place and free entry, the Philharmonic Orchestra of Vienna aims to make classical music accessible to a wide range of listeners / viewers. The summer concert at Schonbrunn, which is a production of the Austrian State Radio and Television broadcast every year live or pre-recorded in over 80 countries worldwide. The palace of Schonbrunn, with its Baroque gardens, a UNESCO World Heritage of UNESCO, but at the same time is the most important tourist attraction of Vienna. The old park only opens once a year, on the occasion of this concert.

Pianomania takes the audience on a humorous journey through the secret world of sound and accompanies Stefan Knüpfer in his extraordinary work with the greatest pianists in the world. To select the instrument that corresponds to the vision of the virtuoso, according it to his desire and accompany him until he goes on stage, Stefan Knüpfer has developed nerves of steel, a boundless passion and above ability to translate words into sounds.

"It is not every day that Brahms sounds so perfect as this," enthused the Kurier newspaper, describing Buchbinder’s performance with the Vienna Philharmonic. The “phenomenal piano virtuoso” plays the First and Second Piano Concertos of Johannes Brahms in the Golden Hall of the Vienna Musikverein with Maestro Zubin Mehta, who has long been intensively associated both with the orchestra and with soloist Rudolf Buchbinder.

Uto Ughi recounts Ludwig van Beethoven, performing: Romance in F major for violin and orchestra, Op. 50, with I Filarmonici di Roma; the Kreutzer Sonata with R. Buchbinder; Sonata Op. 24 in F major with T. Vasary; Concerto in D major for violin and orchestra, Op. 61, with the MMF Orchestra and Maestro Mehta.