Our last two formal concerts of the trip were an incredible way to end it! On Saturday evening, after a long day of train confusion to go to Haydn's residence and tomb at Eisenstadt, we made it back into town just in time for The Magic Flute. We were a bit underdressed for the opera due to the time crunch but it the opera house was phenomenal and the production was amazing! The Wiener Staatsoper sometimes puts on a different production every night of the week, and I'm sure all are of the same caliber. The entire cast of the opera had beautiful voices and sang so well together it was hard to believe they hadn't been doing the opera every night of the week. The queen of the night's aria was spot on and had me on the edge of my seat- she was so intense!
The next day we went to the Kunsthistorisches museum, which has an extremely comprehensive collection of Italian Renaissance and baroque art as well as Flemish, Dutch, and German painters. The works were in such good condition it was hard to believe many of them are older than the United States!
I enjoyed the Rembrandts especially- the emotion in his portraits is incredible!
That night we saw the Tonkunstler Orchestra conducted by Yutaka Sado. They played Haydn's "Midi" symphony and Bruckner's 4th symphony. The contrast between these two pieces was stark, even though they were written only a little over a hundred years apart. Haydn's music was very much focused on the chamber music and salon side of things, while Bruckner's orchestration was lush and full. The conductor was one of my favorites on this trip- he was so expressive! In the big moments in the Bruckner he didn't over conduct at all, he stepped back and let the orchestra take over. Leading into some of the big moments, he would drop down really low and slowly stand up and raise his arms, not keeping any sort of clear time. The orchestra responded to this wonderfully and their crescendos were musical and together. The brass section was so strong I thought I could feel a breeze sometimes when they all started playing! On top of all this, they played in the Musikverein, which is the golden hall where the Vienna Philharmonic plays when they are at home. It was an incredible concert to go out on!
This trip has been every bit as eye opening as the first time I went, if not even more. It will take a while to process all the incredible things I saw and heard, and I hope I never get over the awe that so much of this trip has inspired.
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