Herbert Chappell's highly acclaimed original BBC Film is the story of a remarkable journey made by the composer and explorer David Fanshawe which inspired his celebrated work African Sanctus. The film retraces his musical steps up the river Nile to the source of the Nile's music. Featuring many of the original musicians he first recorded in 1969, Fanshawe explains the ethos behind his work and the process of composition. On a quest to find his African mentor, The Hippo Man, he ventures forth. The Updated Film, 1995, projects stirring and poignant images of Africa, This film combines authentic footage spanning 20 years, with Fanshawe's innovative score. We see glimpses of the performance with The Bournemouth Symphony Chorus, Choristers of St Georges Cathedral, solo Wilhelmenia Fernandez, conducted by Neville Creed. The film also introduces Fanshawe's new work Dona Nobis Pacem - A Hymn for World Peace.
Ute Lemper sings a collection of art songs by Michael Nyman based on texts by Paul Celan, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, William Shakespeare and Arthur Rimbaud. It was filmed at the Musikhalle, Hamburg, 4 February 1992.
"If I could work my will, every idiot that goes about with ‘Merry Christmas’ on his lips would be boiled with his own pudding and buried with a stake of holly in his heart" So spoke the immortal words of Christmas’ most famous miser, Charles Dicken’s Ebenezer Scrooge. Too mean to join in with the festivities; he sits alone on Christmas Eve. The scene is set for a visitation by the ghost of his late business partner, Marley, now bound to earth by eternal chains and his introduction to the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Future. For it is they who will take him through his life to face the truth about himself…
