A famous writer once said, “After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.”* Visit Vienna and discover what inexpressible sounds like. You’ll find new meaning because it’s overwhelming with orchestras, opera houses and choirs, including the 500-year-old Vienna Boys Choir. It’s also home to some of the greatest composers who ever lived—Haydn, Schubert and Strauss. And there are countless museums dedicated to music, including the popular House of Music devoted to the sweet sound of music. (Meaning actual music, not the von Trapp variety!)
Vienna’s city centre is a UNESCO World Heritage site and walker’s (not to mention, waltzer’s) paradise. Stop by Mozarthaus, Mozart’s actual 18th century apartment, where he’s said to have hosted lavish concerts and wild parties (that got particularly out of hand when his good friend Haydn was on the guest list.) Make your next stop at St. Stephen’s Cathedral where legend has it Beethoven realized that he was deaf after seeing birds fly from the bell tower without hearing the bells. And opposite the Konzerthaus (or Concert House) is the Beethoven Memorial that was built in 1880 and funded, partially, by the proceeds of Liszt’s final public performance 50 years after Beethoven’s passing.
If you feel crotchet-ty about classical music and prefer to keep it to a minim-um, check out Vienna’s Guglgasse Street for more modern sounds. It’s in this industrial enclave that you’ll find the Walk of Stars, Austria‘s version of Hollywood’s Walk of Fame, with contributions from modern rockers Kim Wilde, Alice Cooper, Jamie Cullum and Suzi Quatro. You can also explore four 19th century gas tanks, named gasometers, which were transformed into an impressive urban center in the 1990s. One now stands as a music hall that entertains up to 3,000 music lovers at a time.
*Aldous Huxley