Vienna trip July 2010

[Quijote]

Back now in Strasbourg, so I thought I would post a few lines about my recent trip to Vienna this July. It was hot (like the rest of Europe, I suppose), but at long last I had my chance to make my “Beethoven pilgrimage” and to eat a real “wiener schnitzel” (simply, a breaded deep-fried veal [or more usually, pork] cutlet). In general, I found Vienna to be a most elegant city, and quite easy to get around, using the very good metro and tram system.

I only had 4 days in the capital, and I could hardly expect to drag around my partner and young daughter to see all that I wished to see, so I had to be selective. I give you then just the highlights, knowing that much remains to be seen and experienced on another occasion. To make it all digestible, I’ll break my visit down into several postings, as follows ...

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a) Beethoven’s grave, the central cemetery: a huge area, but forewarned is forearmed, so I knew where to find the “goodies”, so to speak. Actually, the cemetery is not really central at all, rather to the south east of the city, but easily accessible. Anyway, who wants a cemetery in the city centre? I digress. I found the moment curiously underwhelming emotionally, but fascinating nevertheless. There is Beethoven’s grave, two steps away from Schubert’s, Brahms’, Strauss’s and others (Mozart, Salieri, Schoenberg … the list goes on). I felt much more emotionally engaged in the Bonn cemetery, where I found purely by chance Beethoven’s mother’s grave. Luckily, there were very few tourists, and I easily had half an hour to myself in front of these illustrious tombstones and final resting places. What did surprise me was to see the graves of Nanette and Andreas Streicher so close by. I think that fact alone brought the “reality” of Beethoven closer to home – other ‘real’ people who lived and died around the same time.

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b) The Pasqualiti house, where Beethoven lived on and off for quite a few years. This was interesting, though the museum (which it now is) was slightly disappointing when you realised that the real apartment that B occupied was on the other side of the landing! It seems that the true apartment is now occupied by rent-paying tenants. I was sorely tempted to knock on their door and have a look around. Still, at least it was in the same building and on the same floor. It had many LvB artefacts (sugar tin, salt and pepper pots, letters, manuscripts and so on, though probably all facsimiles). What was engaging was to walk up the four floors in a building that has little changed since B’s day. Did he have a lot of shopping bags to haul up, I wonder?

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c) The Lobkovitz palace. This was fascinating, not least because there was a “Mahler’s Vienna” exhibition on at the time. The highlight though, was the “Eroica Saal”, the very room where B’s 3rd was first played, and the “Orpheus” 4th Piano Concerto. This, for me, was a moving moment. Again, I was lucky, and only a few tourists disturbed my reverie as I contemplated the room and walls that surely had absorbed those sounds. I spent a good few moments feeling up the walls. I stood around the room at different places, thinking : “Beethoven may well have stood right here, shouting and cajoling the orchestra”. It is a beautiful room, and has wonderful acoustics. Ah, to have been there at the time ...

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d) The Imperial Palace, or Hofburg Imperial Palace. I forget, did B set foot in this place? When he gave lessons to Archduke Rudolph? No matter, it is an extraordinary place, and not to be missed. The size, the opulence, the extravagance, is overwhelming. No doubt it was an exciting time to live, especially during the Bolshevik revolution ...

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Apart from the above, there were quick visits to various churches (nor forgetting the magnificent St Stephen’s cathedral), where one learnt that Mozart’s Requiem had had extracts played, one of Mozart’s early apartments, and so on. Vienna is full of places where you would stumble across a building with a plaque on the façade announcing that such and such a composer-writer-poet-politician-psychologist once lived-ate-wrote-composed-frequented. Though I suppose this would be true of many a major city.

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A last coincidence : leaving Vienna last Friday (23 July), we decided to break our return drive to Strasbourg for lunch in the village of Melk. We stopped there simply because we were hungry, it could have been any other place off the motorway. Melk, Mulk, Malk, it meant nothing to me. I parked the car near the village centre. It’s an old village. First building we pass? Well, the birth place of Abbé Maximilian Stadler. The very same fellow who contributed to Ariatti’s original “50 Diabelli Variations”. About 100 metres down the road (still looking for a good “stubli”), a plaque on an old building, stating “Bruckner often stayed in this former inn on the way back between Vienna and Linz”. I had yet another "schnitzel" for lunch.

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In conclusion, I think Vienna and its environs would be a dream for music historians everywhere. I thoroughly recommend it. I didn’t have nearly enough time to fully explore the “Beethoven angle”, and I think you would need a good week to do so exclusively (i.e. no bored partners, children and so on ...). If you also wanted to fully check out the Mozart-Haydn-Schubert-Strauss-Brahms-Mahler-Schoenberg-Berg-Webern (and other “lesser” composers) part of the city’s history you would need to spend a year there. The heat this summer made it difficult; I shudder to think how the winter is, there.

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Peter and/or Chris : please do move this thread if not in the correct forum.

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Just one last point : my thanks to those forum members who very kindly gave me suggestions (via private message) for accommodation in Vienna. I did check out your tips, but finally opted for the following, which I can fully recommend for its low price, its "design aspect" and its central location :

http://www.fewo-direkt.de/ferienwohn...o_Image_LDES_1

[Michael]

Glad you enjoyed your trip, Philip. I was there for two days last March (plus two days in Bonn). I got to see Beethoven's grave, plus the Theater an der Wien and also walked the Beethovengang in Heilegenstadt, but, as you said, it is difficult to see all you want without allowing for other family members who are not Beethoven maniacs.
I completely forgot about Beethoven's mother's grave in Bonn which I would have liked to have seen. Regarding Vienna, it would take several weeks to see all the areas connected with Beethoven, let alone Mozart and the rest of them.

[Peter]

Thanks for the update Philip, it all reminds me of my wonderful trip several years ago when there was the big heatwave on in Europe - we had temperatures around 37C whilst I was in Vienna. You saw most of the sites I visited, but the highlight for me was the recreation of the Dec 1808 concert in the Theater an der Wien - a very moving experience.

[Sorrano]

Yes, thanks for the updates! So far I can only dream of being in these places and walking the same streets, sidewalks, etc. that these great and noble ones walked. Your posts certainly have made me feel pensive about it and often I think that the full impact comes only after having been there. Thanks, again!

By the way, how was the schnitzel?

[Hollywood]

Hey Philip, I'm sorry that the time you were here in Vienna the weather was so hot and awful. Too bad you didn't come this week. Currently it's 15° and will get up to 20° later on. The rest of this week will average about 23° which will be a lovely and pleasant break from the hot and humid days we have been having lately. Too bad I didn't know you were in town. We could have met at a Beethoven spot of choice, but to tell you the truth due to the awful heat last week I didn't go out much at all.

Sounds like you had a nice visit despite the heat. I hope at least your hotel room had A/C. You also mentioned a visit to Melk. Did you make a visit to the monastery there on the cliff overlooking the Danube? It's HUGE and hard to miss but worth a look.

[djmomo17]

Me and my wife are planning a vacation to go to Vienna in the fall - thanks for your account of the Lobkowitz Eroica hall, I can't wait to go there myself. I really wanted to see the Harnoncourt Beethoven concert at the Theater an der Wien but that is unfortunately sold out...fortunately there are guided tours of the Theater so that will be something to look forward to. Going to the city where B. was most active will be like going to Mount Olympus or something....