classical music | Fotoeins Fotografie

Posts tagged ‘classical music’

My Vienna: Johann Strauss II, traces & places

Above: Danube river at dusk, facing southeast from Brigittenauer Sporn. Photo, 11 Jun 2022 (X70).

Vienna is a historical city of music with the likes of Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart, Schubert, and more. In the mid- to late-19th century, the Strauss family of composers created a dominant scene in Viennese waltz (Wiener Waltz). Johann Strauss II’s “An der schönen blauen Donau” (The Blue Danube) is one of the best-known compositions of classical music. The song was used famously in Stanley Kubrick’s film adaptation of Arthur C. Clarke’s novel “2001: A Space Odyssey“.

And as in the movie, the soaring feelings of hopeful anticipation during the spacecraft’s journey and docking with the spinning space station have become as routine as my arrival onto Viennese shores from the other side of the big eastern pond. I rely on Vienna to provide the gravity to maintain balance and spirit; this much has stayed true over multiple consecutive summers.

I’ve spent over 100 total days in Vienna, explored many of her streets and districts, and walked hundreds of kilometres. Efforts to immerse myself in various types of the city’s art and architecture have been accompanied by the sounds of brass horns and sweeping strings in a back-and-forth “dance” that spans the entire city. There’s new opportunity to learn about the song’s composer who was born, raised, studied, worked, and died in the Austrian capital city.

With the 200th anniversary of Johann Strauss II’s birth in 2025, the city of Vienna celebrates the occasion with a multitude of arts and culture events over the entire 2025 year.

( Click here for images and more )

24T83 Bonn again, new observations

(E82)

Bonn is a city of Beethoven; Ludwig the composer was born and raised in Bonn, before moving to and making it big in Vienna. A number of places in Bonn honour the memory of Beethoven. It’s also easy to forget Bonn was once the capital city of West Germany for over 40 years. Post-war rivalry and tension had escalated with the division of both Berlin and the nation into “west” and “east” entities. Bonn became the new capital of West Germany from 1949 to 1990, until the Fall of the Wall and subsequent reunification. It’s never been a full move to this point in time; a number of federal departments still remain in Bonn.

I’ve visited the city before, but not with real depth on my part. To begin “again”, here’s how I saw sunny Bonn on travel day 83.

*“Cassius and Florentius”, by Turkish artist Iskender Yediler in 2002. These two figures are buried in the church behind, and are Bonn’s patron saints.*

*Universität Bonn (University of Bonn*).

*Münsterplatz: Beethoven memorial (by E. Hähnel 1845), in front of the Postamt.*

*Stadtgarten: Neues Beethoven Denkmal, by M. Lüpertz, 2013. In 2022, I saw another copy of this very same sculpture at Vienna’s Beethovenplatz.*

*“In this house Beethoven was born on 17 December 1770.”*

*Famous Beethoven portrait by J. Stiehler, 1820.*

*Inside Bonn’s Haribo store with lots of gummy bears.*

All photos were made with an iPhone15 on 29 Jul 2024. This post composed with Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

24T58 Eisenstadt: the home of Haydn

E57 V24

From Vienna, regional express trains take about an hour southeast to Eisenstadt, capital city of the Austria federal state of Burgenland. Eisenstadt is also the “home of Haydn,” where the composer and music director spent many years under the auspices of the Esterházy family.

Joseph Haydn, 1732-1809: musician and composer; considered the “father of the symphony” and “father of the string quartets”. Haydn also mentored Mozart and taught Beethoven.

Below are some highlights from my day trip from Vienna to Eisenstadt.

Joseph-Haydn-Platz

*“Music director for Prince Esterházy, Joseph Haydn once lived and worked here.”*

*“Eisenstadt: die kleinste Großstadt der Welt” (the world’s smallest big city).*

*Behind the St. John of Nepomuk column is …*

Haydn Mausoleum

*A peek inside through the locked door.*

*The skull and corpse were finally reunited in 1954. The complete remains of Haydn lie here.*

Haydn Museum

*Joseph Haydn: Mass in B-major, Hoboken XXII:13, “The Creation”, 1801.*

*Hammerklavier (piano forte), by Anton Walter, Vienna, 1780-1790. It’s very likely Haydn played on this very piano.*

*Autographed “Anton Walter in Wien”; a 1-Euro coin for comparison.*

*Porcelain bust of Joseph Haydn on a china-blue stand, by Anton Grassi, 1st copy, 1802.*

I made all photos above with an iPhone15 on 4 Jul 2024. I received no support from any external organization. This post composed with Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

Vienna Heiligenstadt: Beethoven, despair, deafness, & his 6th Symphony

Above/featured: Memorial statue in Vienna’s Heiligenstadt Park; more details below.

Composer Ludwig van Beethoven spent a total of 35 years in Vienna, from 1792 with his arrival from Bonn until his death in 1827. Every summer, he would leave Vienna to stay in a country- or farm-house in Heiligenstadt which at the time was rural; a stagecoach trip from the inner city required several hours. Today, urban development and expansion have reached and overtaken the once verdant fields right up to the flanks of the city’s northern heights.

By 1802, Beethoven’s hearing loss was almost complete. With his doctor’s recommendation, Beethoven had hoped time away from the noisy city would help recover some of his healing, but after the summer had passed, his initial fears had come true: his hearing would not return. In desperation, Beethoven wrote to his brother a letter, known as the “Heiligenstadt Testament“. He never sent the letter to his brother; the letter would only be discovered 25 years later with Beethoven’s personal effects, shortly after his death in 1827.

I’m tracing out some of Beethoven’s footsteps in Heiligenstadt wrapped inside the present-day city’s 19th district of Döbling. All locations can be visited comfortably on foot in a single day. The following description is part of a larger overview of my search for Beethoven in the Austrian capital city.

( Click here for images and more )