by Genevieve Williams
"You've got your passion, you've got your pride
But don't you know only fools are satisfied?
Dream on
But don't imagine they'll all come true
When will you realize
Vienna waits for you"--Billy Joel, "Vienna"
For centuries, Vienna has been counted among the music capitals of the world. Mozart, Haydn, Schubert, and Strauss were only a few of the many composers who lived and worked there, and the Viennese dedication to musical performance remains prominent to this day. The Vienna Boys' Choir has existed since 1498; jazz musician Joe Zawinul, chiefly known for his adventuresome willingness to transcend genres, hails from the city and has written a number of tunes about it.
Ask anyone about their favorite song about Vienna, and most will think about it for a little bit before answering, "The Blue Danube Waltz." Perhaps more properly titled "On the Beautiful Blue Danube," the piece was written by Viennese composer Johann Strauss II, who was famous for his waltzes and who, like Zawinul, wrote several pieces in honor of his home town. These included "Tales from the Vienna Woods," "Vienna Blood," "Vienna Bon-Bons," and the well-known "Skaters' Waltz." As the city that made the waltz famous, Vienna boasts many of them from its most celebrated composers; in addition to Strauss, there is also Franz Lehar, whose "Vienna, City of My Dreams" is often considered the quintessential example of this type of piece.
Of course, Strauss was hardly the only classical composer to write in and about Vienna; like him, many other composers wrote dances. Schubert, Beethoven, and especially Mozart, who spent most of his working life in the city, all composed dances in the German style. Vienna has also boasted some of the finest musicians and performing ensembles in the world for centuries. In addition to the aforementioned Boys' Choir, there's also the Vienna Philharmonic, the Vienna Opera, and more. One of Vienna's most well-known singers of the last century was tenor Richard Tauber, who was famous for his operetta performances. He was also a composer. Although he eventually became a British citizen, his recordings included "I'm in Love with Vienna," "Greetings, Vienna," and "Vienna, City of My Dreams," mentioned above.
Vienna has also been a home for jazz. Though the aforementioned Zawinul has roved far and wide over the course of his career, both literally and musically, he's also written several songs celebrating his home town. Among the most notable is "From Vienna, with Love," from Zawinul's groundbreaking 1965 release, The Rise and Fall of the Third Stream. The former Cannonball Adderley and Miles Davis sideman and Weather Report founder, also composed a large-scale work, Stories of the Danube, based on tales and events of central European history in general and Vienna in particular.
American jazz musicians were drawn to Vienna as well. Many of them moved to Europe after World War II; as one of the premier musical centers of Europe, Vienna, like Paris, was a major destination. Oscar Pettiford, the pioneering bassist and cellist, relocated to Copenhagen two years before his death in 1960; during those two years, he recorded extensively. Among the recordings was "Vienna Blues," a musical meeting of old cultures and new. Then there was tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon, who moved to Europe in the early 1960s and remained there until 1976. His 1967 recording Day in Copenhagen included the hard-bop tune "A Day in Vienna."
Of course, romantic composers like Tauber found inspiration in Vienna as well. The Austrian composer Robert Stolz made his way to the States and eventually all the way to Hollywood before returning to Vienna in 1946. Chiefly known as a composer of operettas, he wrote many songs that refer to the city of which he was made an honorary citizen, including "The Woods of Vienna Are Calling" and "Dreams by the Danube."
To this day, Vienna remains a musical and cultural center, for modern as well as classical forms of music. There's the anthemic "Springtime in Vienna" from Canadian alterna-rockers the Tragically Hip, Linda Eder's emotionally laden "Vienna," and Billy Joel's song of the same title, written after a visit with his father, who lived in the city. While the Tragically Hip's frenetic song is full of tension and activity, Joel's "Vienna" is all about taking the time to smell the roses, or perhaps to wander the city's ancient streets. As for Eder, her song encompasses all that Vienna has come to represent as an archetype: "'Cause in Vienna/We were poetry/Yes, in Vienna/Love was alive/Watching you watching me/All that our eyes could see/All of the nights/We chased into the dawn/It was the best time of my life."
Vienna was also the home of Austrian pop superstar Falco. Best known in the United States for his 1986 hit "Rock Me Amadeus," he also had a minor hit with the ballad "Vienna Calling." Though something of a one-hit wonder who had faded to obscurity by the time of his death in 1998, Falco sampled extensively from Vienna's musical heritage: classically trained at the Vienna Conservatoire, he also dabbled in jazz-rock before switching to pop. Vienna, it seems, turns up everywhere, from a song by early-1980s New Romantic group Ultravox to late-1990s London DJ Frankie Valentine. The ancient city's musical influence didn't end with Mozart, or even with Strauss: it continues to the present day.
Genevieve Williams is a freelance writer specializing in music, book reviews, and film. She is a former music editor for Amazon.com and a regular contributor to Blues Revue.
