Summary: J.S. Bach occupies a pivotal place in the history of music. His compositions represent both the height of the Baroque and the beginning of the Modern Age of music.

Summary: Mozart's music accompanies this documentary with Kenneth Branagh's perfect narration and the blend is very effective. We can learn more about the man who wrote these masterpieces and the hell he was living while he wrote them than from any other program or book on the subject.

Summary: For many people, musicians and laymen alike, Beethoven is the most admired composer in the history of Western classical music – not only because of the intellectual rigour of his music, but also its expressive power. Beethoven’s struggle to resist being defeated by his deafness has a parallel in his music. This programme explores all aspects of Beethoven’s life, the music and the man, his views on life, politics and the French Revolution.

Summary: This film introduced to the world of Franz Schubert through a series of documentary vignettes shot for the most part in Austria. These vignettes are interspersed with musical movements drawn from two of the composer s quartets and two of his lieder.

Summary: Antonín Leopold Dvorak was a Czech composer of Romantic music, who employed the idioms of the folk music of Moravia and his native Bohemia. His works include operas, symphonic, choral and chamber music. His best-known works include his New World Symphony, the Slavonic Dances, "American" String Quartet, and Cello Concerto in B minor.

Summary: The composer's music is brought to life on screen through a choreographic staging where actors and dancers who are seen alternately by themselves or in the company of musicians attempt to recreate within a symbolic d cor the universe inhabited by the two lovers.

Summary: Neatly dividing its time between a documentary on Handel and a reconstruction of his life this entry into the Great Composers series also features plenty of the music that made his name.

Summary: Antonio Lucio Vivaldi, nicknamed il Prete Rosso, was a Venetian Baroque composer, priest, and famous virtuoso violinist. He was born and raised in the Republic of Venice. The Four Seasons, a popular series of four violin concerti, is his best-known work. His other compositions include over 500 instrumental concertos, sacred choral works and over 40 operas.

Summary: Interweaving documentary and fiction this film offers a glimpse into the life of the composer Robert Schumann through his chamber music. Movements drawn from his Quartet in A Major Op. 41 no. 3 and Quartet in A Minor Op. 41 no. 1set the stage for the development of the lavish fresco freely inspired by the life of the composer one of the leading figures of Romanticism.

Summary: Mendelssohn's work includes symphonies, concerti, oratorios, piano and chamber music. He also had an important role in the revival of interest in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. After a long period of relative denigration due to changing musical tastes and antisemitism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, his creative originality is now being recognized and re-evaluated. He is now among the most popular composers of the Romantic era.

Summary: This documentary styled film draws the viewer into the life of Tchaikovsky to the sound of one of his most popular works The String Serenade. The film features on screen performances by the I Musici de Montr al Chamber Orchestra the actors and the dancers bended with original skillfully crafted documentary vignettes inspired by the life of the composer.

Summary: As Romanticism was replaced with Impressionism in the early 20th century Claude Debussy became its most influential composer breaking with traditional form and harmony. This documentary explores Debussy's life and work evoking the tumultuous times that gave rise to his progressive and innovative music.

Summary: Through documentary-style vignettes and choreographed movements inspired by famous arias for the voice and piano this DVD The End of the Voice recounts the life story of Italian opera composer Giacomo Puccini while presenting his works- with the turn of the century as background.

Summary: Ravel is known for his varied instrumentation his use of traditional structures to present innovative harmonies and his wide range of influences which included jazz folk and Asian music. This artistic documentary uses Ravel's beautiful "String Quartet in F Major" to tell the composer's story.