Salzburg

There are two major reasons to visit Salzburg: Mozart and the Sound of Music - and I did both as thoroughly as any human being with only 25 hours in the city could do!

So I arrived in Salzburg at 11.30 am and after sorting out accommodation and getting a rough idea of the city (and a bit of book shopping - a few simple books in German to improve my language skills!), my first event was a Sound of Music bus tour at 2pm. There are 3 different companies that run essentially the same tour at the same times, which is really quite strange. The one that I went with claims to be the original and had letters of approval from the real Maria von Trapp, Christopher Plummer and Julie Andrews, so I was expecting big things!

To be completely honest, I was a little disappointed. Sure, we went to some of the places that were filmed in the movie, but there were several notable omissions. For example, the brochure said we go to the abbey where Maria started out in the film, but we drove past it quickly and the tour guide pointed it out - I couldn't even see it... The other things I really would have liked to see that weren't included on the tour were the open air auditorium where they make their final performance and the cemetery where the dramatic ending takes place. Also, I was promised atmosphere and people singing along and being generally silly - maybe i just got a dud group... but they didn't even start playing the soundtrack until 90 minutes into the tour and there were no video clips at all! I'm also still trying to work out why we visited a little town in the Lake District near Salzburg - it was incredibly beautiful, but really had nothing to do with the movie other than a gift shop that sold Sound of Music merchandise. In comparison, The Sex and the City tour in New York was a lot slicker, and had probably raised my expectations a little high.

On a positive note, the things we did see were great. Try to keep the songs out of your head while looking at the pics - they can get a little irritating (and I had forgotten how much Julie Andrews' over-enunciating really annoys me.)

The building and lake that were used as the rear of the Von Trapp house,

The Gazebo from "Sixteen Going on Seventeen" (though it wasn't raining...):

the wall where they filmed "I Have Confidence" (not pictured)

The Mirabell gardens from "Do Re Mi" (though this was where the tour started and finished and we had to explore them ourselves outside of the tour, so I'm not sure if it counts!):

and finally the Chapel where Maria and the Captain get married:

True to my travelling experiences so far, the inside of the wedding chapel was completely scaffolded...

The tour gave a really great overview of Salzburg and the surrounding area, so while I was disappointed, I certainly don't regret doing it.

After a quick dinner, I then headed to Schloss Mirabell for a Chamber Music concert in the Marble Hall. A spectacular venue (though overpopulated by tourists, of course) and some nice music programmed - Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusic and a Piano Quartet, and excerpts from Alban Berg's Lyrische Suite. Here is a pic of the marble staircase to the concert venue (which was equally spectacular)

Basically, the concert convinced me that I am going to become one of those annoying old men that sits and scowls through classical music concerts, convinced that they would have been better to sit at home and listen to the CD they have of the same pieces... There were several things about the concert that really irritated me. Firstly, the acoustic was incredibly ringy (lots of echo) so all of the faster sections of the music blurred together, especially in both Mozart pieces. It didn't help that the musicians took the final movement of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik way too fast, so it was just a muddy jumble of notes. Or that the pianist was playing a huge Bosendorfer grand piano that was much too loud for the strings - and she insisted on using the sustain pedal heavily throughout the piece, making it even muddier. The whole quartet was quite traumatic for me to listen to... though it did remind me how passionate I am about this music and that I do kind of miss it at the moment.

On the positive side, the Berg pieces were fantastic. Extremely well played (interestingly, the strings had a different 1st violinist for these pieces, and suddenly the quartet were musically unified - so different from both Mozart pieces) and very interesting pieces. I think I may have been the only one that enjoyed them, though, in the touristy "we came expecting to hear some nice Mozart pieces" audience...

A good nights sleep, and then the morning to explore the old part of the city and more Mozart!

The morning started out in Mozart's Wohnhaus, where the family lived from when he was 17 years old. The items on display were quite interesting and I really am growing to love the hand held, enter-a-number style of audio commentary. Also a very good gift shop, where my need for good Mozart led me to buy a 10CD set of the 4 major operas (surprisingly good recordings of the operas for 35 Euros!) and 2 DVDs of Mozart Operas done by the Salzburg Marionette Theatre (the puppets featured in "The Lonely Goatherd" number in The Sound of Music!)

Finally, a wander through all the major sights of the old city - especially all of the incredible churches. The highlights for me were the Salzburger Dom (Cathedral - pictured), and the cemetery at St Peter's church (another incredible baroque church) which had catacombs and everything - it is said that this was the cemetery that the set for the final scenes of Sound of Music were inspired by - so maybe I did see them after all.

I really liked the way everything maintains the authenticity of the design in the old city - even a corporate giant has adopted the style of shop signs in the main street:

Overall, Salzburg is really a beautiful city and despite a few disappointments, it was another fantastic (but exhausting) overnight visit. Back to work for another week and then probably Munich next week, I think!