Ilse’s Reviews > Schubert's Vienna > Status Update
Ilse
is on page 120 of 304
It is frequently overlooked that Schubert was one of the most prolific composers of exquisite music composed specifically for social dancing. Vienna could claim to be a City of Dance as much as the City of music. Perhaps because so many activities were circumscribed in the reign of Francis I, dance provided a sese of liberation while affording opportunity to display one's social graces and sophistication.
— Jan 18, 2025 03:10AM
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Ilse
is on page 114 of 304
Edward Holmes recalled his visit to Vienna around 1828:"No place of refreshment, from the highest to the lowest, is without music: bassoonists and clarionets are are as plentiful as blackberries and in the suburbs at every turn one alights upon fresh carousing, fresh fiddling, fresh illuminations".
No wonder my mother had hoped to find a violinist on every corner when she visited Vienna in 1998(?).
— Dec 28, 2024 04:09AM
No wonder my mother had hoped to find a violinist on every corner when she visited Vienna in 1998(?).
Ilse
is on page 109 of 304
For the middle class, a piano in the parlor was a symbol of bon ton. Many eyewitnesses suggest that the ability to perform music improved one's chances of finding a wealthy mate or of securing new business clients. For the well-educated bureaucrats, whose work was often tedious and whose public conduct was scrutinized by the secret police, salon concerts were an important outlet and for some an avocation.
— Dec 27, 2024 01:36PM
Ilse
is on page 84 of 304
As late as 1822 a group of English players performed several plays of Shakespeare to a Parisian audience largely ignorant of his works and - with the exception of the young Berlioz and a few like-minded companions, not at all inclined to accept them. At the performance of Othello, Desdemona was wounded while curtsying, by a projectile thrown from the audience.
— Dec 13, 2024 08:55AM
Ilse
is on page 75 of 304
The 19th century, while enjoying the blessings of peace in righteous innocence, was merciless in condemnation of the Congres (of Vienna). Yet who today, in surveying the savage record of unrestrained national passions in the 20th century, would be ashamed to shed a nostalgic tear for the peacemakers of 1815 and their lilting Congress? It danced, yes, but not on the backs of the corpses.
— Dec 12, 2024 03:26AM
Ilse
is on page 74 of 304
On the outcome of the Congress of Vienna: Austria's gains were less impressive, but considering a chronic state of near bankruptcy, a polyglot population, and general exhaustion, its domination of central Europe seems almost a miracle.
— Dec 12, 2024 03:22AM
Ilse
is on page 53 of 304
The censorship controlling cultural production may have unwittingly promoted music because revolutionary motifs in music are less easy to discern than in literature. 'Does the censor know what you think while you are composing?' asked Grillparzer in Beethoven's guestbook.
— Dec 08, 2024 08:15AM
Ilse
is on page 52 of 304
Why Viennese culture,and especially music, could flourish in a city that had hardly recovered from the Napoleonic wars?In a multicultural city, where so many languages were spoken - German,French,Spanish,Italian, as well as Hungarian,Czech,Slovak,Ukrainian,Serbian,Croatian,slovene, and Greek - music might have seemed to some inhabitants the easiest form to communicate.
— Dec 04, 2024 12:37AM
Ilse
is on page 22 of 304
The state’s suspicion of intellectuals was such that many citizens who desired careers in government avoided higher education in the belief that it would work against their obtaining a position. In the Vienna of Francis I, the police did not employ systematic brutality and terror in surpressing ideas, the possibility of arrest, the loss of one’s job, and other deterrents made that unneccesary.
— Dec 01, 2024 12:42PM
Ilse
is on page 22 of 304
In 1794, a resident of Vienna reported:"Several important persons have been arrested here.It is said that a revolution was to break out - but I believe that as long as the Austrian has some dark beer and little sausages he will not revolt.The gates to the suburbs must be closed at ten. One doesn't dare raise his voice here, otherwise the police find lodging for you." The writer was Beethoven.
— Nov 29, 2024 03:19AM
Ilse
is on page 21 of 304
Metternich strove to persuade all parties to suppress revolution immediately so as to preserve the new status quo permanently. Although all governments of the time were repressive to some degree, Austria became known especially for the ubiquity and omnipresence of its police surveillance.
— Nov 27, 2024 07:57AM
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Jan-Maat
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Jan 18, 2025 04:15AM
I had never thought of Schubert as a composer of dance music before...
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Jan-Maat wrote: "I had never thought of Schubert as a composer of dance music before..."Me neither, but I am mostly ignorant about Schubert’s body of work, never having read about or listened to it in a systematic way. According to this book, he composed literally hundreds of dance pieces, often in sets up to thirty-six individual works (eg D365 comprises thirty-six waltzes). Dance music constituted about 40 percent of the approximately five hundred works of Schubert’s published during his lifetime�
