It was grand night in Vienna, or rather a grand Saturday afternoon at Strathmore Music Center in Bethesda which successfully simulated the world-famous New Year’s Concert in Vienna. On the 30th Anniversary season program of Salute to Vienna New Year’s Concert were the anticipated elegant Viennese waltzes (and other dances) as well as selections from Viennese operettas.
This year at the annual event at Strathmore (also held at several other locations in North America), the focus was on three operettas, with the concert starting with the Overture to Johann Srauss Jr.’s New Year’s party-themed “Die Fledermaus”, an overture light and airy which then almost trotted to a conclusion. The orchestra was conducted here and in the other offerings under the able baton of the Vienna-trained conductor Nir Kabaretti. The concert also ended with a salute to champagne from “Die Fledermaus.”
Inbetween were generous selections from other operettas, but most notably “The Merry Widow” and “Gypsy Princess.” Emmerich Kálmán’s “Gypsy Princess,” a tale of a young nobleman who seeks to defy his father and marry a stage singer whom the son loves, was sampled twice. Baritone Thomas Weinhappel performed an excellent “Ganz ohne Weiber geht die Chose nicht,” which Maestro Kabaretti translated loosely to applause as “nothing in the world functions without women.” The song was suggestive of both Austrian and Hungarian musical styles.
Mr. Weinhappel joined soprano Rebecca Nelson in a beautiful duet of “Das ist die Liebe,” or “That Is Love,” again from “Gypsy Princess.” She also sang a poignant “Vilia” (“a fairy tale love song,” as Maestro Kabaretti put it) from Franz Lehár’s “The Merry Widow.” An instrumental medley of tunes was then played from the same operetta (including the famous “Merry Widow Waltz,” along with “Da geh’ ich zu Maxim” from the same Lehár operetta). Here baritone Weinhappel sang glowingly of “going to Maxims,” the legendary Parisian restaurant. Soprano Nelson emerged playing military-style phrases on the trumpet followed by a rousing “Chacun le sait” from Donizetti’s operetta “Daughter of the Regiment.”
Europanballet St. Pölten (Austria) and International Champion Ballroom Dancers added exotic gowns and national costumes to the proceedings and, of course, dances which were elegant and, at times, whimsical. Indeed, dance performances to the orchestra’s playing of the famous Viennese waltzes “Rosen aus dem Süden” and “The Blue Danube” particularly illustrated the elegance of old Vienna. Quick-paced polkas were presented in Johann Strauss Jr.’s “Auf der Jagd Polka” and Johann and Josef Strauss’ “Pizzicato Polka.”
The audience itself had its opportunity to be conducted under the direction of Maestro Kabaretti as it clapped along to Johann Strauss Sr.’s “Radetzky March” in one of the program’s several encores. Indeed, these encores whetted the appetite of the audience for next year’s Salute to Vienna New Year’s Concert, which has become an annual tradition for many in the Washington, D.C., region.
