Later Career
A highly successful biographical film, A Life in the Country, was first shown on BBC TV in 1976. Bream also presented a series of four master-classes guitarists on BBC TV. BBC TV has presented a programme about Julian Bream's life as a concert guitarist. In 1984 he made eight films on location in Spain for Channel 4, exploring historical perspectives of Spanish guitar music.
In 1991, BBC Radio and TV broadcast Bream's BBC Prom performance of Malcolm Arnold's Guitar Concerto. He also participated in a recital and concerto performances of works by Tōru Takemitsu at the Japan Festival in London with the London Symphony Orchestra.
During the 1992-93 season he performed on two separate occasions at the Wigmore Hall - at their Gala Re-opening Festival, and at a special concert celebrating his 60th birthday. In the same period, he toured the Far East, visiting Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea and Japan, and performed the premiere of Leo Brouwer's arrangement for guitar and orchestra of Albéniz's Iberia at the Proms. In 1994 Bream made debuts in both Turkey and Israel to great acclaim, and the following year played for the soundtrack to the Hollywood film Don Juan de Marcos.
In 1997, in celebration of the 50th anniversary of his debut, he performed a recital at Cheltenham Town Hall. A few weeks later, the BBC dedicated a special television tribute This Is Your Life programme to Julian Bream, filmed after a commemorative concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London.
In recent years, his engagements have included a Gala solo performance at the Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool, a Kosovo Aid concert at St. John's Smith Square, London, with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields recitals at the Snape Proms, Aldeburgh, and at the Norfolk and Norwich Festival and a tour of UK National Trust properties in summer and autumn 2000.
In November 2001 he gave an anniversary recital at Wigmore Hall, celebrating 50 years since his debut there in 1951.
The 2003 DVD video profile Julian Bream: My Life In Music contains three hours of interviews and performances. It has been declared by Graham Wade "the finest film contribution ever to the classic guitar." It became "GRAMOPHONE DVD of the year". His series Guitarra! was made for British television and charts a journey across Spain.
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