Patrick Bade
Romance in Vienna: A Valentine’s Day Special
Patrick Bade - Romance in Vienna: A Valentine’s Day Special
- Well, as you all know, it’s going to be Valentine’s Day tomorrow. So Trudy said to me, could I put to get some together something that would be a bit more lighthearted and in keeping with Valentine’s Day. So I said I would do a talk about romantic Vienna, but I’m using the term not with a capital R, not in the historical sense of the Romantic period or romantic style, in the popular sense of candlelit dinners and rose petals and all that kind of stuff. And the two most romantic cities in Europe are usually thought to be Vienna and Paris. And they are the two cities which have had the most songs written about them. So I thought I’d start off with a song about Vienna sung by the inimitable Austrian tenor, Richard Tauber.
SONG BEGINS
♪ Heaven Vienna mine ♪ ♪ I’m in the spell of your charms divine ♪ ♪ Dressed like a queen with life so gay ♪ ♪ You are the love of my heart today ♪ ♪ Heaven Vienna mine ♪ ♪ Laughter and music and stars that shine ♪ ♪ Wonderful city where I belong ♪ ♪ To you I sing my song ♪ ♪ My heart seems to beat ♪ ♪ With rapture so sweet ♪ ♪ I walk through the town in a trance ♪ ♪ A lady so fair beyond all compare ♪ ♪ Has filled me with joy and romance ♪ ♪ Her moods and her wiles ♪ ♪ Her frowns and her smiles ♪ ♪ Keep changing so quickly each day ♪ ♪ No wonder I dream ♪ ♪ Her beauty supreme ♪ ♪ Enslaves me and I must obey ♪
SONG ENDS
- Now, my fascination with Vienna began at a very early age, and not in Vienna itself, but in a place probably only Brits will have heard of called Bognor Regis. And there, probably, only Brits will understand the rather, I don’t know, depressing connotations of Bognor Regis. But anyway, when I was five years old, I was listening to the radio and I heard this voice. And for the first time in my life I fell completely head over heels in love with this voice. And the voice was of the soprano Miliza Korjus and you can see she was also a very beautiful woman. And I took to carrying a photograph of her in the heart pocket of my school blazer. And at the time I was in my primary school, it was run by nuns and they were up rather upset by this. They thought it was idolatry. And they told me, “No, no, you shouldn’t have Miliza Korjus in your heart pocket. You ought to have the Virgin Mary.” But also, I didn’t say anything, but I secretly thought, “Hmm, I think I really prefer Miliza Korjus, she’s rather more appealing to me.” So here is the ravishing voice of Miliza Korjus, which really set me on a journey to Vienna.
SONG BEGINS
♪ One day when we were young ♪ ♪ One wonderful morning in May ♪ ♪ You told me you loved me ♪ ♪ When we were young one day ♪ ♪ Sweet songs of spring were sung ♪ ♪ And music was never so gay ♪ ♪ You told me you loved me ♪ ♪ When we were young one day ♪
SONG ENDS
Now Miliza Korjus starred in a 1938 MGM film called The Great Waltz, which was a fictional and I stress fictional. It was very, very fictional account of the life of the Waltz King, Johann Strauss the second. And this was an incredibly lavish film directed by the French director, Julien du Vivier. Nothing authentic about it, with the possible exception of, oh, you could see how how gorgeous and lavish it was. The only vaguely authentic element in the whole film was the Viennese actress Louise Reiner, who came to Hollywood as a refugee from Hollywood, from Vienna. And she is, I think to this day, the only actress who won Oscar for Best Actress, two years running; 1936 and 1937. And then she left movies very early on and she ended her life in London. She lived to 104 and I used to meet her at concerts. She was a keen concert goer. She’d go to the festival hall. But the most amazing scene in the Great Waltz is the scene in which Johann Straus conducts, he composes the Waltz tales of Vienna woods. And he is being driven through the Vienna woods in a carriage that seems to be pulled by a a three-legged horse that goes clip clop clop, clip clop clop in waltz time. And he’s sitting there with Miliza Korjus and they compose between them the Waltz Tales Vienna woods with the help of a little birdie who does some tweet tweets and a passing male coach with with a horn.
SONE BEGINS
♪ La la la da ya pum pum ♪ ♪ La la la la da dam pum pum ♪ ♪ Da da da da da yum pum pum ♪ ♪ Da yum pum pum ♪ ♪ Da da da da da yum pum pum ♪ ♪ Da da da da da yum pum pum ♪ ♪ Da yum pum pum ♪ ♪ Da da da da da da da ♪ ♪ Da da da da da da da ♪ ♪ La la la la la la la ♪ ♪ La la la la la la la ♪ ♪ La la la la la ♪ ♪ Da da da da ♪ ♪ Come on my rosie ♪ ♪ Come on my rosie ♪ ♪ Da da da da da da pum pum ♪ ♪ Da da da da da da pum pum ♪ ♪ Da da da da da da pum pum ♪ ♪ Da da da da da da pum ♪
SONG ENDS
Now they arrive at a heuriger, that’s one of those little wine inns in the Vienna woods. And Strauss has written the music on his shirt cuff and he presumably hands over the shirt to the orchestra in the heuriger and they play it. Now in the film, the orchestra in the Heuriger consists of 13 beautiful blonde girls all in white Philly dresses. And as the publicity for MGM claimed, each one of them was playing a Stradivarius violin: 13 Stradivarius violins. Of course, wonderfully over the top and totally absurd. Now, if you go to Vienna or have been to Vienna, of course one of the things to do is to go up to the Vienna woods and to a Heuriger, and you’re not going to find 13 blondes with Stradivariuses. You are going to hear something more like this, little band, which might consist of a zither and guitars and a clarinet. And this is the great Julius Patza, very Viennese singer, notice his amazing Viennese vowels. Viennese are notorious for their sentimentality. And it’s a very special kind of sentimentality with a strong vein of melancholy, a sort of sighing quality. So I’m going to stick with Patzak and the music. And this is a song entitled, I don’t know if I can do the Viennese, but it’s… That’s the best I can do for Viennese. And it’s a memory of a beautiful love in his youth. So that dying fall there is very, very Viennese. So Vienna is also famous for seduction and sensuality and famous also for illicit love.
And if you wanted illicit love in Vienna, I dunno if this still works, you would hire a chambre séparée, a little room discreetly hidden away and it would have dining facilities and it would have a chaise longue for the after dinner entertainment. Last time I went to Vienna with a group for Kirke holidays, we had dinner at the Hotel Sacher, it’s the most famous hotel in Vienna. I had to say the dinner was not really very good. It was pretty overpriced and second rate food, but it was an interesting experience. If you go to Vienna, actually I recommend that you go to the Hotel Sacher but not for a meal. Go there for a drink to soak up the atmosphere in the lounge or the bar. But it was very interesting, it was an enormous building. And the Maitre D took us down a very long corridor that was lined with doors. And I said to him, what are these doors? You know, are these all chambres séparées? And he said, yes, that’s exactly, exactly what they were. I dunno if they’re still used for the same purpose. But our next song is by Heuberger, a very famous song from his operetta, Der Openball. And as you can see, it’s . So it’s a song of seduction with a young man trying to lure a girl into a chambre séparée with the offer of champagne and supper. Now, the Viennese are notorious for being cynical and for their duplicity, like the English, they have a reputation for being two-faced, saying one thing and doing something totally different. Now, of course, from the many the years Well a lot of the time that I spent in in Munich, in my early adulthood, I suppose I developed certain German prejudices against the Austrians and the Viennese.
There’s is a rather nasty German saying, the golden heart of Viennese is filled with shit. I’m sure a lot of people thought that in 1938. Anyway, I’m going to play you next, a song that illustrates this sort of double sidedness of the Viennese. And it’s sung by the great Fitzi Massary. Now, she was born, she’s a Jewish girl, born in the suburbs of Vienna probably, Weberstadt I suppose. And she started off her career in Vienna and she had an affair with an aristocrat and had a child and it was a real love affair and he was desperate to marry her. They very, very much wanted to marry. But of course you can imagine this is 1900. And there was huge pressure on both of them to split up. And that’s what happened eventually, she was kind of bought off and she was banished from Vienna. She was sent to Berlin where she very quickly conquered the city. Almost, you could say she was queen of Berlin from the early 19 hundreds right up to the Nazi takeover in 1933. She was absolutely adored. I mean, read what Strauss and Hoffmansthal said about her in their correspondence. They actually wanted to write an opera especially for her. But she declined because she could earn a lot more money doing her normal job as a operetta singer. But I’m going to play you this delightful song by Franz Lehár, . This is a lover who’s making false promises in order to seduce a woman. He says, I’m going to fetch the blue from the sky for you and everything you want, I will bring for you and everything you’ve dreamed of, I’m going to make true. Now I’m going to talk in a slightly gossipy way about the love lives of the great composers who were based in Vienna, starting with Mozart and continuing with Beethoven, Schubert, and Brahms.
Now Mozart arrived in Vienna in 1781, and as I’ve told you before in my lecture on Mozart, he very quickly got a commission to write the opera, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, The Abduction From the Seraglio and this coincided with his engagement to a young woman called Constanze Weber. And he calls the heroin of his opera Constanze. And I think the aria I’m going to play you is very much his declaration of love. I mean, he was engaged to her, they were not yet married. And it’s an aria full of longing, full of love, full of longing. Here is the young Constanze on the left hand side. On the right hand side is a photograph found, discovered in 2006. And it’s a photograph that’s taken in 1840. And it’s thought to be the age of Constanze. Constanze at the age of 78. Now I’m convinced by it, the nose is certainly very much the same nose and the chin seems to be the same chin. Anyway, here is Belmonte in the Abduction From the Seralglio describing his impatience and his longing. Of course, Tauber is absolutely wonderful in this. The music itself. You know, you hear the beating of the heart and you hear the eagerness and the impatience of the lover. ♪ Constanze ♪ ♪ Constanze ♪ There’s been a lot of speculation about Beethoven’s love life. He never married. And as far as we know, he never had any children. There is a mysterious letter dating from 1812 addressed to his immortal beloved. Well who was she? We don’t know for sure. Did she even really exist? Anyway, I’m going to allow the great Lotte Lehmann to take the story further. And this is from an American radio broadcast, amazingly, of December, 1941. So she made this broadcast literally days after Pearl Harbour. I suppose it could have been recorded earlier, but you do rather wonder what the American public just after Pearl Harbour must have made of this.
[Lotte] It breathes poetry in quiet longing. The melody is simple and soaring. And the repeated question, when do you think of me? Where do you think of me? How do you think of me? Is held in a delicately rising crescendo up to the outbreak of restrained longing until union on a better star. One can understand that it was just this verse of the poem that inspired Beethoven, for it is more than probable that his well-known, immortal beloved was an ideal. And his adoration for this ideal finds sublime expression in the longing cry until we may united on a better star. I will sing now, Andenken, remembering.
Oh, that was another voice I fell in love with, but somewhat later. Now Schubert also was unmarried and there is also a lot of speculation about his love life. Was he straight? Was he bisexual? Was he gay? There is some evidence that he was gay. But of course that was not something that people, I suppose, wanted to celebrate later in the 19th or the early 20th century. And there was an operetta written about him and his supposed love life called Das Dreimäderlhaus. It was a tremendous success in the 1920s. And it was turned into a movie called Blossom Time in the 1930s, starring Richard Tauber. That still exists, you can see it. And various songs of Schubert were orchestrated for the musical and for the movie. And here is one of them. And this is Brahms, who was of course from North Germany, from Hamburg. But he came to Vienna as a young man and he stayed there for the rest of his life. And he was another composer who never married and as far as we know, never had children. And like Beethoven, he was somebody, I think, searching for love, wanting love, but maybe possibly afraid of the commitment of love in as far as he found love, it was in the arms of prostitutes. He had a very close relationship with Clara Schumann and there is speculation that they might have had an affair.
And it does seem that when Robert Schumann died, she thought that that Brahms would propose and would want to marry her, but in fact, to her surprise it turned out he was more interested in marrying her daughter, in fact he married somebody else. So I’m going to play you, oh, here is the aged Brahms. Well not that aged, he was in his sixties. And I’m going to play you a song called Ewige Liebe from Eternal Love, which is an extremely passionate declaration of love. I think it’s most gorgeous song. A very emotional song. Big, theatrical, operatic. It makes you rather regret that Brahms never got round to writing an opera. Sung there in slightly accented German by Victoria de Los Angeles. Now, the greatest opera that celebrates Vienna is Richard Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier. Now of course he wasn’t Viennese, he wasn’t Austrian, he’s very Bavarian. And at the risk of some sort of stereotyping, even racist cliche, course Bavarians have a totally different personality from the people of Munich and the people of Vienna. Bavarians are sort of bluff, bit more straightforward without all that sort of, you know, smiling hypocrisy you might say of the- and all the intrigues and so on. So it’s amazing really that Strauss captures this Viennese atmosphere and all the sort of things going on beneath the surface and all the intrigues, so wonderfully. But of course he had the help of his Viennese librettist Hugo van Hoffmansthal.
And I’m going to play you the great trio that ends the opera. I can’t think, can you think of another opera with such a wonderful, cathartic, sublime, amazingly beautiful ending as the Marshall in the princess gives up her young lover to a girl of his own age. And here it is. So in that gorgeous, gorgeous, sumptuous, ecstatic music, there’s a vein of melancholy. And there’s a vein of cynicism too. And the marshal then says, well, of course he’ll be as happy as any man really understands how to be happy. So she realises that it’s not quite the happy ending that it seems to be. Well one reason that the Rosenkavalier became so very, very popular, I think, in the 1920s and thirties was that it encapsulated a Vienna that was gone, a Vienna that had been swept away by the First World War. So it was a lot of nostalgia in people’s love for De Rosenkavalier. And in the 1920s, Noel Coward had a tremendous success with a musical called Bittersweet, which also I think capitalises on that nostalgia for a Vienna that no longer existed. So this is an original cast recording from Bittersweet with Peggy Wood and the Romanian heartthrob, Georges Metaxa.
SONG BEGINS
♪ I’ll see her again ♪ ♪ Whenever spring brings her again ♪ ♪ Find that I’m heavy between ♪ ♪ But what has been ♪ ♪ Is but forgetting ♪ ♪ This sweet memory ♪ ♪ Across the years will come to me ♪ ♪ Though my heartbreak will arise ♪ ♪ If my heart will ever lie ♪ ♪ Just the echo of our sigh ♪ ♪ Goodbye ♪ ♪ This sweet memory ♪ ♪ Across the years will come to me ♪ ♪ Though my heart has gone arye ♪ ♪ If my heart will ever lie ♪ ♪ Just the echo of our sighs ♪ ♪ Goodbye ♪
SONG ENDS
Vienna is a marvellous city and it’s a very exciting city to visit with so much to offer. Incredible museums, marvellous architecture and so on. But as we all know, it has a very dark side. And I was really, this was brought home to me very, very strongly. It must have been about 1990, I think. I went to Vienna with my friend Cheryl Tannon and her sister Vivienne. And their family, they were actually originally from Berlin, but they fled from Berlin in ‘33 and they were in Vienna from '33 till '38. And then they escaped to Canada, where luckily they did very well. But we talked a lot about it. And Shell said to me that she and her sister really wanted to go back to Vienna and they wanted to see where their parents had lived. But they were kind of afraid to do it. And they asked me if I would go with them. So we went together and I must say, going round Vienna with two Jewish women gave me a different slant on the city. And I think we did, we picked, I think a lot of people recognised that we were a Jewish group. And at that point, 1990, I think things have changed. I think they’ve got better, but I did definitely pick up some unpleasant antisemitic vibes. And there was one experience in particular, I’ll never forget, it was really like a scene out of Third Man. We went to the apartment block where her parents had lived, big 19th century apartment block with a rather grand entrance. And there was an old woman with a mop and she was mopping.
We were standing there looking at it and she saw us and she was extremely suspicious, really hostile, “What do you want here? What do you want?” And it was such a strange and disturbing moment. And I’m going to finish talking about two films that were made immediately after the Second World War, both of which expose, you could call it, the dark underbelly of Vienna. The first is a film of 1950 by Max, the great, great director Max Ophüls, called La Ronde. And it’s based on Schnitzler novella Reigen, which I talked about briefly once before. And I know of course Trudy’s talked about Schnitzler and it’s a story of a young soldier who picks up a prostitute and they have sex and she infects him with a venereal disease. And then he goes on to have an affair with the ladies maid and he infects her with a venereal disease. And then she has an affair with a gentleman. And so the disease goes through every layer of Viennese society and it comes back to where it started from at the end of the movie. So it’s a very beautiful movie. It’s a gorgeous movie to look at with wonderful actress actors, Simone Signoret, Serge Reggiani in the scene that you can see. So it’s that strange Viennese combination of sensuality, beauty, seductiveness, but with something incredibly dark going on at the same time. And for this movie, the great operetta composer, Oscar Straus wrote a waltz, the Waltz La Ronde, which became an international hit.
And I’ve been struggling all day today to get this to play for you cuz I couldn’t find my own copy. Anyway, my friend Mike in in Munich managed to send me by We Transfer. And by wonders of modern technology, I’m able to play you this very gorgeous waltz by Oscar Straus. Here it comes, I hope, please. After- Oscar Straus was a very old man when that film came out. And I can’t help wondering whether he composed it freshly or whether it was something that he’d taken with him in a suitcase when he fled from Europe to America before the the Second World War. Well, the film that for most people encapsulates the sinister dark side of Vienna, is Carol Reed’s, The Third Man that came out in 1949, wonderfully atmospheric film. Joseph Cotten and what’s her name? Alida Valli. And cause Vienna was bombed, not as badly as some of the German cities, but quite heavily damaged. And the bomb damaged city provides a wonderful visual backdrop to the movie. And the other thing of course that it’s very famous for is its musical score. And this, apparently, when they were researching the film, quite by chance, they heard an zither player called Anton Karas and they thought, yes, this is Vienna, this is the atmosphere of Vienna. So it probably was the one of the cheapest musical scores that’s ever been commissioned cause it’s just him playing the zither all the way through the movie. But it’s so effective. And particularly this Third Man waltz became a huge international hit and was number one in the American hit parade for several weeks. Right. Well, let’s see what we have here.
Q&A and Comments:
“Greetings from a Canadian now in Brussels. Enjoy Brussels.” That’s another city. Very underrated city. I love Brussels and I’m trying to persuade Kirker to let me take a group to Brussels. Linda, thank you.
“Bought my Klimt at Home book.” Thank you. Thank you very much. Very sunny in- Well it was horrible and grey here today. I don’t sing it quite as well as Tauber, but I agree with your mother. It’s wonderful. Yes. Yes, I hope you’ll forgive me for my rude comments about Bognor Regis. Well, most English people only know it for the fact that when George the Fifth was told by his doctor he was going to Bognor Regis, his last words before he died were, bugger Bognor.
Q: “Checked in late. Whose voice is it?”
A: That was Miliza Korjus. It’s your list, as usual.
Q: How did people picture keep Monocles?
A: I don’t know. That is a question I do not know the answer to. Before Miliza Korjus it was Richard Tauber.
Ah, this is Sandy saying, laughing at that scene. It’s wonderful though, isn’t it, that movie? I know it’s kitsch, but it’s what the Germans would call Edelkitsch, noble kitsch. Lots of songs about grincing. But grincing actually, if you’re going to go out to Vienna Woods for grincing of course, now because it’s so famous and celebrated in the songs, it has become horribly touristy so that you could probably find another little village in Vienna Woods that would be better. Yes, I agree with you. The Sacher is a clip joint, but it’s still very, I mean, it’s worth paying for an expensive glass of wine or champagne. Cause it’s got this amazing ballad box sumptuous atmosphere. I wouldn’t eat a meal there again, voluntarily. And I think the Sacher torte is also overrated. It’s often rather dry and uninteresting.
By Strauss, The Gershwins. Yes, I do know that, of course. It’s wonderful. The name of the Jewish soprano from Vienna who went to Germany. It’s on your list, again. It’s Fritzi Massary, a fabulous, amazing artist. In Switzerland, the common thread about Vienna was that they’re very friendly with smiles on their faces and the knife in the back.
Yes, that is the reputation that they have. But whether it’s true or not, I don’t really know. On holiday in Vienna 1953, I visited various coffee houses, daily newspapers on wooden frames were available.
Yes, that does still exist. I think, the lectures, I think there’s going to be, we’re planning a website and I think it will be possible to listen to all the lectures again. Blossom House, another song my mother in Holland sang. She didn’t have great voice, but it was special.
Yeah, thank you. And musical theme that is Schubert again. Was Beethoven right-handed? As far as I know, he was right-handed. I’d never heard that he was left-handed. In paintings, of course can be misleading. This is David saying thank you for transforming my hostility to German. Your talk seem to bring out the fascination. Well I think German is a very beautiful language. I really do. And I think it’s got very unfortunate associations, obviously for historical political reasons. So I’m going to get back to where I was and people, course you hear a caricature of Germany in a lot of war movies.
So yeah, listen to something else. Listen to Schubert, listen to Bach and then you’ll realise what a very beautiful language it could be.
Here we are again. Interesting. Yes, I remember seeing that movie, Immortal Beloved, about Beethoven’s famous love letter to an unknown woman. But there are different theories about who it could be.
Of course, yes. Noel Howard did write the musical Bittersweet. And I’m glad you enjoy the gossip. Didn’t think it was too frivolous. Thank you. Competing voices, I dunno what they were. This is Eli Straus I had a similar experience. Was in Vienna on business. Had to go to visit the apartment house on Holland Strata where my mother grew up. Went to see the apartment, they wouldn’t let me in. It kept me insisting. Yeah, yeah. Well I sort of in a way understand it. It’s bad conscience of course. That kind of hostility.
Fritz Kreisler, yes. Wrote, the great, great violinist, wrote, very, very charming bel epochas, I suppose you call them salon pieces. Peggy Wood, vocalist in Bittersweet was Mama in the TV series, I remember Mama. Yes. She had a long career. I think isn’t she in the Sound of Music as a nun?
Miss Judith, where my mother returned to her hometown, Bendorf, Austria after war, she recognised a local gardener. She greeted him, but he turned his back on her. The Nazis arianized the family’s store and house. My aunt says she could not bear the sweet voice hypocrisy of the Viennese when she returned. Yes. I wonder why. That, you know, it’s probably fear and guilt that caused that man to behaved in that way. Now warned another nostalgic melody.
Never saw the movie. Do see the movie! It’s a wonderful, wonderful movie. It’s a perfect movie. In, I think, Max Ophüls is such a brilliant, brilliant director. The visual side is really stunning. I’m sure that Rogers and Hammerstein were very familiar with La Ronde Waltz. Thank you Elda.
This is Esther. Growing up Intel Aviv in the forties, these melodies were played in cafes and restaurants by Jewish musicians that came from Vienna, Berlin, Frankfort, et cetera. Yes, yes indeed.
And somebody who’s never seen the Third Man. Is there anybody who’s never- I’ve never understood why it was called the Third Man, but do see the movie.
Alexandra, amazing to see where Joseph Cotten emerged from the river under the bridge in Vienna in the Third Man. Thank you Sandra. The Brussels music museum is fantastic. It’s in the most amazing art Noveau building. It’s been copied by many other museums, but I think it was the first museum where you went and you wore headphones. And as you approach the different instruments, you could actually hear them. Yes, I hugely recommend the musical instrument museum in Brussels. It’s fantastic place.
Q: Is it a polka?
A: You’re probably right. It’s a polka rather than a waltz. Nostalgia. Thank you Joan.
Yes. Happy Valentine’s Day to everybody. The Third Man and the Clockwork Orange had been played for members of attending medical bioethics meetings.
The Third Man, of course, yes, which is all about the black marketing of penicillin at the end of the war with terrible, terrible consequences. So yeah, it’s a very, very dark movie, but a wonderful one. Bognor Regis. Yes. Oh dear, oh dear. Thank you all for your very kind comments.
This is Gerald, saying you can’t visit Vienna. Well, I sort of understand it, but I do think Vienna has really, he says that you’re saying that Barrie Kosky antisemitism runs out of the taps. I don’t know, I feel that in the last few years that there has been, that the Austrians have a little bit followed in the footsteps of the Germans in acknowledging their guilt. And the big problem for ages and ages was the myth that the Austrians were the first victims of Germany rather than the enthusiastic collaborators of Germany. But I think, you know, once that, now I think people mostly accept that. And once you’ve accepted it, I think, then you should be able to move on. Thank you for your kind comments and is there anything I need to answer. Thank you again.
Sacher, somebody else saying it’s very overrated. But oh, please, who’s this? Maram, we want to try your Sacher torte. Kirke holidays is based in London. I am doing a tour to Vienna in June and I’m doing one to Munich in August. And we’re planning a Paris one too. I’m thrilled about that cause I’m going to be working with my absolute favourite tour manager and I love working with her. Everything goes like clockwork. Somebody else visiting the building where their mother lived. Yes. I suppose they just think you want to go back to reclaim the property.
Mary Widow. I love the Mary Widow of course. And I could very happily do you a lecture on the Mary Widow. Elise Charles saying German can sound harsh, but I mean when a Tauber of course is with his Austrian accented German is so charming and Lotte Lehmann, how beautiful German sounds when she speaks it or sings it. Thank you all for your kind comments.
Anna. Anna Sach. Yeah, she’s not really one of my favourite singers actually. I always preferred Miliza Korjus of that type of singer.
Josef Schmidt. Yes, now you’re talking. I would love to do a talk on Josef Schmidt. I think he’s an absolutely amazing singer. And more people saying they’ve had similar experience going back. Land of smiles. Oh, lucky you.
Saying Land of Smiles, because he sang it, he performed Land of Smiles in that theatre, a gold as green hippo drum. I wonder if that was where you saw it. I know. It must have been so strange for people going back and recent film Beloved Clara about Schumann and Brahms. Yes, thank you. God, the people, the things that people say that they think are funny are not funny.
This is funny. Bernstein. Other people saying it was difficult to return. There’s a wonderful movie about Jews returning to Czechoslovakia in 1945 and seeing that the panic and hostility it created, called 1945. I haven’t seen that. The Music Museum in Scottsdale, Arizona. Well I’m not like to get there anytime soon, but that’s a good recommendation.
Could I get MRT, I dunno. MRT haven’t asked me to do anything this year, apart from I’m doing lectures for them on impressionism in music. If anybody’s interested, that’s coming up in March. But La Ronde was performed on the stage in the Aldwych Theatre in the mid seventies. But you know, the movie is so perfect. The trio, it’s the second carry on recording. Anna Tomowa Sintow. It’s on your list actually if you want to check on the list. And “Austrians have got better.” I think so too. That’s my impression that things are much better than they used to be. In Vienna 15 years ago, we asked a Jew how many Jews in Vienna? He answered, who knows. No one would admit to be Jewish here today. I don’t think that’s true now actually. It may have been true 15 years ago.
Q: Is Ted Kirken?
A: No, I don’t think he has anything to do with it anymore with the company. A stapelstein.
This is Gita saying outside her parents’ home children laid lilac branches there in the Department. Some people don’t like the idea of a stapelstein. I do. They say, “Oh, it’s not nice that you are walking on them.” I don’t see that really. No, I think it’s good. I’m in favour of them. 1945, recent movie about two Jews returning to Hungarian Village and about the response of the townspeople. Yes, I will look out for that, sounds interesting. The Vienna trip is, it may be on your list. Cause I think I did put it on one of the lists. Probably this one you’ve got for this lecture.
It’s in June of this year with Kirker. That’s K I R K E R. And as far as I know, they still have some spaces on that. Third Man, Orson Welles is the star.
Well, he doesn’t have the big part in it actually. He kind of stole the show cause he was so charismatic. But actually he’s not in the movie for very much of it.
Fritz Kreisler. Yeah, let me think about that. And a lecture on Fritz Kreisler would be an interesting one. Both on, he’s had a very interesting life, obviously with interesting political connotations in the thirties. And he’s a delightful composer on a small scale. And of course, most one of the greatest violinists. So that will come.
Aurelia, I’d love to go to Brussels with you. That’d be really fun thing to do. Let’s talk about it. The Mary Widow Folks Opera, the 19- Lyric Charlesbury Avenue. Cause you know, Tauber, oh, it’s Peter Greece. Tauber did it. You know, his wife claimed that there was not one day in the second World War where he wasn’t singing somewhere. I mean, he really did a lot, I would say for the British War effort.
Brussels was, yes, definitely great museums. And I’m not really into chocolates, but you can eat well in Brussels, of course.
Berlin full of stapelsteine. Yeah, I’m glad that- I think they’re a good idea, as I said. Yeah, Kreisler one of the greatest violinists. And we’ve got to the end with Bia from Mickey. Thank you all very, very much indeed. And on Wednesday, we’re going back to Marla, but Marla in New York and this time next week we’ll be looking at the dreadful and fascinating Alma. Thank you all. Bye-bye. Happy Valentine’s Day.
- Thank you everyone, and we’ll see you on Monday. Take care. Bye-bye.