Mozart and Strauss Concert

 Vienna is a huge dense city, unlike Budapest which has a large river frontage and open spaces with clear views of the river and high mountain in the Buda side to see the wide spread of the city. Vienna does not have a picturesque view of the Danube River nor high mountains nearby where one can see the lay of the land. There are no natural highlights but tall towers, or large Ferris wheels like the famous structure in the movie ‘The Third Man’.

However, there is charm in the city streets with the imperial palaces of the Hapsburg or former princes like the legendary general Prince Eugene of Savoy with his Belvedere palaces. Other noteworthy structure is the immense Opera house or the other Hapsburg palaces that have been turned into museums. There is also the food. We had an excellent dinner of lamb kebab and chicken skewered server with rice, sour crème, pickles, onions and beets. For starters, we had excellent Bortsch and pumpkin soup and for s=dessert a strudel and Turkish coffee.

The central train station and the tram system were excellent though we had to figure out the train lines and the route to travel in the city. After dinner, we watched a concert where a young group played various pieces of Mozart, Strauss pieces in a small concert hall Wiener Music house near the restaurant which was an Albanian or Turkish restaurant that faced the street where people walked about and some smoked Shisha pipe on the tables outside. One can feel the wealth and ease that comes from a rich state.

The television shows did not have English sub-titles unlike in Budapest which is refreshing to see an un-Engligh leaning country that is confident of its European history. I watched YouTube videos of the Hapsburg Dynasty and how the family became an empire. In the exhibition at the Belvedere, the paintings by Klimt and Egon Schiele and the other artist that led the Vienna Succession offered a new way of seeing things. Their style was a real break from the romantic view and more towards an impressionistic way of seeing.

 Any new empire would have a whole different way of seeing reality and would be reflected in their new art, whether in painting or literature. This confidence of being on the vanguard of the new may often lead its rulers into wars such as the First and Second World War. The Hapsburg empire was a true multi-ethnic state that had several innovations that heralded a new way but unfortunately led to devastation and eventually demise.