In the evening, we went out to a concert by the Wiener Hofburg-Orchester. We were expecting it to be a load of hackneyed well-worn “popular” classics, but were pleasantly surprised by the programme. Whilst it was mostly Strauss and Mozart, they’d managaed to squeeze in some Lehar (who he? -Ed) as well. The Strauss was very polka and waltz-oriented, with ballet dancers for two of the dances. The Mozart was almost all comic arias or duets from his most famous operas. I've consulted my resident music expert and she informs me that they were much better on the Strauss than on the Mozart - even my untrained ear picked out a part where the orchestra and the soloist got a bit out of synch.
Here’s that programme in full:
There was nothing too challenging, but it was a good
light-hearted evening of music. There were a few comedy moments when the senior
percussionist and the conductor had some disagreements about how a piece should
be played (all carefully scripted, of course), which added to the fun. The
finished up, inevitably, with the Blue Danube, and then did a couple of encores
including the Radetsky March, which we all clapped along to at the direction of
the conductor.
We took a circuitous route back to the ship so that we could see all the buildings on the Ringstrasse by night.
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