British pop duo Pet Shop Boys captured on film 1-3 June 1991 at Birmingham NEC on their Performance tour. This film, by Eric Watson, features the live show and footage filmed backstage. Digitally remastered and visually restored in 2004. Setlist:  01. This Must Be The Place I've Waited Years To Leave;  02. It's A Sin;  03. Losing My Mind;  04. What Have I Done To Deserve This?;  05. My October Symphony;  06. I'm Not Scared; 07. We All Feel Better In The Dark; 08. So Sorry, I Said ; 09. Suburbia; 10. So Hard; 11. Opportunities (Let's Make Lots Of Money); 12. How Can You Expect To Be Taken Seriously?; 13. Rent; 14. Where The Streets Have No Name (I Can't Take My Eyes Off You); 15. West  End Girls; 16. Jealousy; 17. Always On My Mind; 18. Your Funny Uncle

Pet Shop Boys: Performance

Combining a concert film with a making-of documentary, this presentation provides a dramatization of Franz Schubert's famed song cycle along with a unique look at the collaborative process in bringing the production to the screen. Tenor Ian Bostridge vocalizes the part of the wanderer from Wilhelm Müller's poems (on which the cycle is based), with Julius Drake accompanying him on piano and David Alden directing.

Winterreise

The English National Opera first mounted David Alden's production of Ariodante, one of Handel's greatest masterpieces, in 1993. It met with unanimous critical and popular acclaim, and this 1996 revival features many of the leading singers from the original production. Ariodante is Handel's 1735 setting of an episode from Ariosto, in which the King of Scotland's daughter is treacherously accused of infidelity to her promised husband. The range of feelings provoked as the characters develop is caught in music of quite extraordinary emotional power, even by Handel's own exalted standards.

Ariodante

Rodelinda

Here is a rare and exceptional example in which the director and costume designer amuse themselves with `silly' costumes, but it actually works. I usually loath the stupid concept of 'clever' producers' of dressing opera singers in an motley set of `modern' and bizarre costumes (mostly tasteless) to help the `stupid' spectators to understand the universality of the opera across time and place. However, in this particular production I enjoyed every moment of it. All my reservations withstanding, I found that the costumes have actually helped highlight the `buffa' aspects of this supposedly `siria' opera. This work may not be among Handel's greatest masterpieces, but the way it is presented and sung here makes it a thorough pleasure for the senses.