Jun 14

Jun 14 Music Appreciation in the Kursalon Hübner

VIENNA, AUSTRIA. After our sumptuous meal in Pizza Bizi, we headed on towards Kursalon Hubner, which was just a kilometer-walk away from the restaurant, for some classical music appreciation. Based on Italian Renaissance architecture, the Kursalon Hübner was designed by Johan Garben and built during the years 1865 to 1867. Adjacent to it is the 6-hectare Stadtpark (City Park) which opened in 1862. During those times, the Kursalon (or rather, the land where it is now standing) only served as a place where visitors can get mineral waters to drink. After its construction, the Kursalon started seeing better days. In 1868, the first concert by Johann Strauss took place in there. Since then, it had become a venue for meetings and concerts.

The Kursalon Hübner is now a known music hall in Vienna which daily runs a Mozart and Strauss concert. Moreover, approximately 500 concerts a year is being witnessed and roughly 200,000 visitors are being took in by this wonderful and historical hall.

The daily concert starts at a quarter past 8 in the evening which makes this an ideal activity to do after having dinner nearby. Though we were in a tour group, we decided to break away from the group that evening to have a good head-start in the Stephansplatz. Add to this the fact that we wanted more to enjoy some bonding time with one another rather than eating at a fancy restaurant complete with a dinner served by course beside the Kursalon, which was also packaged with the concert being offered by the tour company.

Though there was a line that greeted us upon arriving in the ticketing booth, it was nothing that we were not able to manage. We were able to purchase the concert tickets in no time. Tickets range from €92 to €40 depending on where one prefers to seat. We got the seats in the B Section which cost us €54 each which really was good value for it was neither too costly nor the seats too far from the stage.

The hall piled up and the seats taken within half an hour. Through the Salon Orchestra Alt-Wien, which is one of the best-known interpreters of classical Viennese music, and the excellent opera vocalists and magnificent ballet soloists that accompanied them were we treated with an evening filled with cheerful sounds of waltzes, polkas, arias, duets and operetta and piano concert melodies that surely had our hearts dancing and waltzing through the night.