VIENNA MOZART CONCERT
Viennese Classical Music Purely Entertaining
“They
prowl the streets and squares of Old Vienna, these gangs of young men
in their ill-fitting powdered wigs and borrowed waistcoasts,
seeking to lighten the purse of any errant passerby from a faraway land,
enticing them to their chambers of illicit pleasures”. So might
have read an editorial in the 1700s of the public sellers of tickets
to nightly Viennese baroque music concerts. Vienna is a city of music,
or more to the point a city of musicians. Any tourist 
visit
to the great Imperial
city on the Danube should include a musical performance in one of many
grand palaces and concert halls. Of course, there is the state Grand
Opera and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, if you’ve brought
your tuxedo, a few hundred euro and are prepared to be put on a waiting
list. But
why not enjoy your visit to the great city of musical classics in the
grand settings of past centuries as they might have been, enjoyable even
for those who might rarely go to a formal classical music concert.
The Vienna Mozart
Orchestra was born in 1986 when musicians from some of the best Viennese
orchestras joined together to perform in historical
costume with the aim to preserve the cultural tradition and musical heritage
of Vienna’s classical period. The idea of experiencing Mozart’s
soaring music in the environment of the grand concert halls of Vienna’s
Imperial era was a huge success and caught on. The Vienna Mozart Concerts
are performed in some of Vienna’s most beautiful Baroque concert
halls on a rotating basis, the Golden Hall of the Musikverein, The Brahms
Hall, The Vienna State Opera, the Wiener Konzerthaus and the Great Hall
of the Imperial Palace.
The
concerts are of the style of 18th Century “Music Academies” where
single movements of symphonies and parts of concertos, interspersed with
operatic arias and duets entertain with a sampling of composer selections.
The musicians and singers perform on a rotation basis as well, perhaps
rather like a musician’s employment program and as part of the
entertainment value of the experience - the musicians seem to have as
much fun as the
audience. The repertoire of the Vienna Mozart Orchestra (Wiener Mozart
Konzert) includes more than a hundred pieces. The music selections tend
toward the liveliest or most recognized favorites of the composer’s
works to maintain an entertainment level for a more casual audience.
Despite the top billing of Mozart, pieces of other composers are included
in the programs, Johann Strauss is almost always included, identifying
the pure Vienna popularist, an occasional Haydn piece, though one is
unlikely to hear any Beethoven, another of Vienna’s greats, but
one does not clap along with or tap a toe to Beethoven.
Experiencing
Mozart in the magnificent Golden Hall (Goldener Saal) of the Musikverein
built
by Emperor Franz Joseph in 1870 is a treat. The
hall is the traditional home of the Vienna Philharmonic and from where
the famous annual New Years Concert is performed (see Vienna
Music House),
with an intimacy not quite possible in the State Opera. The Vienna
Mozart
Orchestra tours in winter, but others will still play in the city on
the Blue Danube. The format has become so popular, a whole collection
of other theme orchestras in costume and historic venues
have sprouted in Vienna to offer a wide choice. 
The
Strauss and Mozart Concert focusing more on the waltzes performs in the
1865 Renaissance
revival Kursalon with the waltz meister's golden statue in front. The
Imperial Orchestra performs its concerts in the neo-Gothic Imperial Hall
at Beethovenplatz 1 near the Stadtpark, the Wiener Residenzorchester
plays in the ballroom halls of the Palace of Auersperg, and Börse
Palace. and Mozart's supreme somber "Requiem" can be heard
as it was meant to be by the Orchestra 1756 in the Vienna Karlskirche.
The competition for ears has brought the gangs of roving ticket mongers
to the tourist streets of Vienna, but there’s no need to fear a
starving musician in a wig and stockings. Or is there?
Mozart Concert Ticketing
Tickets for the Vienna Mozart Orchestra, the State Opera or other concerts or stage, music and special events can be purchase through the official Vienna Ticket Office with a street office on at Kärtnerstrass 51 next to the Vienna State Opera house. Tickets can be ordered on-line and picked up at the ticket office, or for an extra €10 they can be delivered to your hotel. © Bargain Travel Europe
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Vienna
Mozart Concert
Vienna
Ticket Office
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SEE ALSO:
GIANT
FERRIS WHEEL AT THE PRATER
SALZBURG
MARIONETTE THEATER
WHERE MOZART DIED - THE MURDER MYSTERY
INNSBRUCK'S COURT CHURCH - HOFKIRCHE TOMB
