Happy New Year, everyone.
Tonight, KOCE (aka PBS SoCal) will broadcast the New Year’s Concert from Vienna at the odd time of 6 p.m. It’s usually one of my favorite classical broadcasts of the year (especially if there’s a good conductor, as is the case tonight), but then I like Johann Strauss. Mariss Jansons will lead the Vienna Philharmonic, brought to you direct from the Musikverein. Julie Andrews hosts.
Above, Carlos Kleiber conducts the Wieners in the 1989 New Year’s concert.
I’ve posted tonight’s musical program below. There are a number of the usual suspects, of course, but also some out of the way items. The concert, as always, will end with a pair of traditional encores — the “Blue Danube” Waltz and the “Radetzky” March.
Program:
Johann and Joseph Strauss: “Vaterländischer Marsch (Fatherland March)”
Johann Strauss: “Rathausball-Tänze (City Hall Ball Dances)”, Waltz, op. 438
Johann Strauss: “Entweder – oder! (Either – Or!)”, Fast Polka, op. 403
Johann Strauss: “Tritsch-Tratsch (Chit-Chat)”, Polka, op. 214
Carl Michael Ziehrer: “Wiener Bürger (Viennese Folk)”, Waltz, op. 419
Johann Strauss: “Albion Polka”, op. 102
Joseph Strauss: “Jokey Polka (Jockey Polka)”, Fast Polka, op. 278
– Intermission –
Joseph Hellmesberger, Jr.: Danse Diabolique (Diabolic Dance)
Joseph Strauss: “Künstler-Gruss (Artists Greeting)”, Polka française, op. 274
Johann Strauss: “Freuet euch des Lebens (Enjoy Life)”, Waltz, op. 340
Johann Strauss, Sr.: “Sperl Galopp”, op. 42
Hans Christian Lumbye: Copenhagen Railway Steam Gallop
Joseph Strauss: “Feuerfest (Fireproof)”, Polka française, op. 269
Eduard Strauss: “Carmen-Quadrille”, op. 134
Peter I. Tchaikovsky: “Panorama” from the Ballet “Sleeping Beauty”, op. 66
Peter I. Tchaikovsky: “Waltz” from the Ballet “Sleeping Beauty”, op. 66
Johann and Joseph Strauss: “Pizzicato Polka”, no opus number
Johann Strauss: “Persischer Marsch (Persian March)”, op. 289
Joseph Strauss: “Brennende Liebe (Burning Love)”, Polka Mazur, op. 129
Joseph Strauss: “Delirien (Delirium)”, Waltz, op. 212
Johann Strauss: “Unter Donner und Blitz (Thunder and Lightning)”, Fast Polka, op. 324
Classical Life 
Thanks for the alert about the early airtime! Seeing the “complete” program listing leaves one a bit frustrated at what we did NOT get in the U.S. broadcast. (Personally, I could have done with less of Julie Andrews and more of the concert!)
I wonder if I’m the only one who gets pangs of vertigo when the cameras swoop up, out, and over the hall?
Yes, the U.S. broadcast can sometimes be a bit much. I would imagine that the entire program (that was performed) will be included in the CD and DVD, which will be released soon.
I see Welser-Most is doing 2013 again. I wonder how long it’ll be until Dudamel does it. He seems like a perfect choice.
I’m not a big fan of Welser-Most, though sometimes he can be OK. I watched a little of his previous New Year’s concert and turned it off. Would love to see Dudamel get a shot at it. Salonen should get a chance too, even though he might not be a natural. The orchestra would help him, though.
The VPO website has the news about next year’s concert, PLUS a notice about the summer concert (outside Schönnbrun Palace), which will be conducted by Dudamel. His foot is in the door, it would seem.
Yes, I think Dudamel doing it is only a matter of time. It could be a ratings boon too. He did Blue Danube this summer at the Bowl so he’s not averse to doing it. Don’t see Salonen doing it though. Not sure this stuff is his cup of tea.
It’ll never happen, of course, but it would be a hoot to have Boulez do it!
Would love to see Boulez do it. For much the same reason, I’d like to see Salonen.
Have you ever heard the recording that Boulez made in the 70s of Beethoven’s 5th? It would be fun to hear him do that to the Blue Danube.
There are few conductors (or so it would seem) who did NOT perform the Strauss repertoire; I have fond memories of LPs with Szell and Reiner, names we more frequently see associated with R. Strauss. Boulez, though, seems unlikely. That Beethoven 5 Tim refers to was a real mess, as I recall!
I wouldn’t call it a mess. I’d say it was bizarre, though.
I wonder if I’m the only one who gets pangs of vertigo when the cameras swoop up, out, and over the hall?
I was more curious about how they managed to make the camera fly over the top of the hall—a technique I don’t recall ever seeing before. There didn’t seem to be any wires strung over the length of the Musikverein that could have been used as sort of a guideway. However, I did notice lots of wires strung above and over the orchestra, which didn’t seem to serve any purpose.
This year’s program was better than last year’s, which possibly had a bit to do with 2011’s conductor being the same person who is so “blah” that there was a public-relations mess between him and the former music critic of the main newspaper in Cleveland?
Hostess Julie Andrews seemed more heavily (or over) used this year than before. That’s odd since the whole program, in order to be shortened to fit an hour-and-half format, presumably always requires a lot of scrambling not to find material to fill airtime but just the opposite.
That Boulez/Beethoven 5 recording is fascinating. The tempo of the opening movement is probably the slowest ever. It doesn’t surprise me that it has never been reissued on CD (perhaps that was Boulez’ own doing?)
For one of my classes, I play them several recording of the 1st mvt of #5 and the Boulez is one of them. No one is ever on the fence with it. They either love it or hate it.
After watching the Los Angeles Philharmonic last night on KOCE and observing the wonderful diversity of that orchestra’s musicians, and then knowing the history of the Vienna Philharmonic, I wonder how the two groups have been affected — or not — by shameless or nonsensical forms of politics used in determining who is or isn’t hired to be a member of the band?
I read that one audition held several years ago by the Vienna Phil involved a person playing behind a scrim. The judges thought the person was quite good and wanted to select him. But when that person came out from behind the scrim and the judges noticed the superficial characteristics of the musician (his race), they changed their mind. That’s appalling and nonsensical to me, certainly since I strongly believe in merit always being prized above anything else.
I understand the LA Phil uses a similar “blind test” format when auditioning their potential new musicians. But given the lesson of Vienna, I hope the judges in LA haven’t on occasion been no less guilty of choosing based not on true skill, total talent and the greatest objectivity possible, but on other factors. Or I hope that’s the case since certain observers, including music critics (such as during the Philharmonic’s East Coast tour in 2010), have implied the LA Phil could use some improvement when it comes to comprising the best musicians possible. Of course, that claim goes back to the beginning of the orchestra’s history.
As for the 3 concerts I’ve watched on KOCE over the past several days, the one last night was the most appealing or “user friendly” of the bunch. The reason? The quality of sound out of LA was the best. Even my husband, who isn’t a fan of classical music, noticed a difference. We found ourselves describing it as sort of a “live” or less filtered sound. And the concerts from New York, Vienna and Los Angeles were viewed on the same channel (KOCE), using the same television with the exact same speakers.
While the Mrs. and I certainly enjoyed the LA Phil’s appearance on PBS last night, we are both going to have to strongly disagree with you, Deborah, on the quality of the sound of the “Great Performances” broadcast.
I listened to gala concert over the internet, both live and archived, sometimes on the cheesy laptop speakers, sometimes through earbuds, and other times patched into our fancy home theater system. I thought the LA Phil played magnificently. The audio from the online only broadcast was decent and much more consistent than in the PBS broadcast. On TV, it was as if someone would reach over and turn a knob every now and then to change the overall output, especially right before a big climax. It was annoying. We even wondered out loud if the inconsistency in sound was part of the reason that gala isn’t being released on DVD. Maybe it was just the feed coming from Time-Warner Cable that was messed up. Who knows? All I know is that what was coming out of my not-cheap speakers was sub par.
We also watched the NY Phil’s New Year’s Eve concert streamed online and patched into our home theater system. I enjoyed Mr. Dudamel’s interpretations better than Mr. Gilbert’s; however, both Mrs. CKDH and I thought the sound quality of the NY Phil concert was preferable.
We didn’t watch the VPO NYE concert, but we did watch the Berlin Phil (again, streamed via internet and played through our home theater system). While it was a very fine performance, I probably enjoyed it the least. At the same time, I would unequivocally say that it had the best audio quality of all three concerts, and the video quality was on par with the Time-Warner feed of the PBS LA Phil concert.
To each his/her own, I guess.
I listened to gala concert over the internet, both live and archived
CK Dexter, I notice using the antennae actually results in better reception for at least image quality of a station like CBS than what comes in through our cable line. Our cable service doesn’t even offer KOCE, so in order to watch it, we’re forced to switch to antennae.
I notice on your blog you have a link to the video of the Live from Lincoln Center program on NYE. Thanks for providing that helpful bit of information, for I’d otherwise not have known it was available online.
To figure out your and my sense of hearing — and even within the confines of a computer and its own sound system — when I click on the New York Philharmonic’s broadcast, I immediately sense less than optimal sound quality. When I click on a recording of a broadcast of the LA Philharmonic, but admittedly not from Friday’s program but from 2010, I immediately detect finer acoustics. These are the links I’m referring to:
video.pbs.org/video/2182002440/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhC0h7YikvQ
This is interesting to me, because listening to sound in different settings is sort of like attending a wine tasting. Except instead of using a variety of vintages to fine tune my palate, I’m listening to different recordings to fine tune my sense of hearing.