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Vienna 1971—A Student Journal
A year of music, study, travel, sightseeing & friends.

Day 76 — Sunday walks and music
17-October-1971 (Sun.)

TRANSCRIPT

Wiener Singeknäben — Bruckner’s “Grosse Messe in E Moll.” [Bruckner’s Grand Mass in E minor sung by the Vienna singer-boys—Vienna Boys' Choir.] I didn’t enjoy it quite as much as I could have. Too many people [attending the mass]. Had a very enjoyable talk with an American and his wife (young). Exchanged ideas on what our experiences were doing to us.

A beautiful, clear, and crisp “winterish-cold” day. On a Sunday like today, I always feel really great and happy. Especially when I walk through parks, etc. and see people with their children having fun, etc. [The photo (left) is of a horse and buggy near the Hofburg waiting for a passenger.]

Richard Strauss—Horn Concerto No. 2—played by Hermann Baumann (German hornist) with the Jugendesorchestra. Really an excellent job. (Not perfect, but who expects it to be). Can make the horn sing. The concerto itself is a real virtuoso piece. We made a cassette tape of the concerto. It came out fairly good, even though we were extremely far back. Especially enjoyed it. Also on tape—Stravinsky Pulcinella suite.

On the way back home, Mike G. (friend, organist, from Canada) masterminded a tape called “The Sounds of Vienna.” To use up the tape, and to remember Vienna with. Really hilarious. I was dying with laughter all the while we were making it—you can hear it on the tape. Contains such items as Barry’s, strassebahn, opera, Mozart, etc. What a memory.


REFLECTIONS

Sunday mass. It’s Sunday and I attend another mass sung by the Vienna Boys' Choir—Bruckner’s Mass in E minor. I can say that it wasn’t the music that I didn’t enjoy, but rather that there are too many people trying to squeeze into the church where the Vienna Boys' Choir performs each Sunday. I guess that’s to be expected. Funny, it took me a bit to translate my funkadelic-German—that Wiener singeknäben meant the Vienna Boys' Choir, not the Vienna singing boys. The photo (right) is of a Vienna Boys' Choir member and his family on the way to mass.

Sunday walks. I love walking through the Vienna parks on Sunday. You’ve seen a few pictures already, I’ll post another. It’s great to see people enjoying the city’s many parks. It looks like fall or winter is on the way.

Baumann plays Strauss. Hermann Baumann is another of the world's best known virtuoso horn players. Others include Barry Tuckwell and Dennis Brain. As stated, Baumann gave an incredible performance. Richard Strauss is not the composer who does waltzes. (That’s Johann Jr.) Richard Strauss is a late-Romantic composer known for his rich chromatic harmony and full orchestrations. Strauss is also widely known for his operas and “tone poems”—programmatic orchestral works that supposedly tell a story. Till Eugenspiegel is perhaps the most famous of tone poems. R. Strauss is known, in French-horn circles, for his famous horn concertos (or, concerti, if you prefer), technically much more difficult than the Mozart horn concertos.

Although I don't write about it, I am almost always going to the music concerts and operas with a group of friends from the Academy of Music, and probably my roommate Pavel. It sounds like my friend Mike and I made a tape of that concert and later made a “fun” tape on the way home. Obviously, Mike is the comedian. What is Barry’s? I suspect it must be a place to have dinner, those famous Viennese pastries, or drinks.

Till (Eugenspiel) tomorrow.

John

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Tags: music, concerts, horn concerto, Richard Strauss, Hermann Baumann, Vienna Boys' Choir, Bruckner, parks