VIENNA PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA’S NEW YEAR’S DAY CONCERT,
CONDUCTED BY GUSTAVO DUDAMEL, TO AIR NATIONWIDE
ON PBS’S GREAT PERFORMANCES JANUARY 1
Vienna Philharmonic Musicians to Debut New Concert Attire Designed by
Dame Vivienne Westwood and Andreas Kronthaler in New Year’s Concert
December 29, 2016 – The Vienna Philharmonic’s annual New Year’s Day concert, “From Vienna: The New Year’s Celebration 2017,” conducted for the first time by Gustavo Dudamel, will air on Great Performances on PBS stations across the country on Sunday, January 1 (check local listings for time).
For more than 75 years, the Vienna Philharmonic has ushered in the New Year with the light and lively, quintessentially Austrian music of Johann Strauss, his family, and their contemporaries, performed at Vienna’s Musikverein. Since 1987, the concert has featured a different conductor each year, and this year Mr. Dudamel, 35, will be the youngest-ever to lead the popular and festive New Year’s concert. The Vienna Philharmonic’s New Year’s Day concert is broadcast in over 90 countries and will have an estimated 50 million television viewers, making it the largest worldwide event in classical music.
Among traditional waltzes, polkas and other works, Mr. Dudamel will conduct Strauss’s famous “Blue Danube” Waltz on the occasion of the work’s 150th anniversary, and pieces by Otto Nicolai, founder of the Vienna Philharmonic. Host Julie Andrews will also take the viewer to picturesque Viennese landmarks, including Otto Nicolai’s study in the Haus der Musik, and will join Mr. Dudamel in visiting the student musicians of Superar, the Sistema organization for Central Europe. Mr. Dudamel was famously a product of the Sistema program in his native Venezuela, and this broadcast will offer a special look at these talented musicians of tomorrow.
While the Vienna Philharmonic, which celebrates its 175th anniversary this year, honors tradition and history with the New Year’s concert, it also looks to the future with the debut of its new concert attire designed exclusively for the orchestra by Dame Vivienne Westwood and Andreas Kronthaler.
Chairman of the Vienna Philharmonic, Andreas Großbauer, recognizes the importance of linking the past and present and uniting practicality with modern elegance. “In the age of video streaming and HD broadcasts, it is increasingly important how an orchestra appears onstage. In Vivienne Westwood and Andreas Kronthaler, we have found a design duo which suits the high standards of the Vienna Philharmonic brand.”
The new philharmonic suit features an updated design to the traditional garments worn by the orchestra. Customarily, men of the Philharmonic have performed in the Stresemann, a semi-formal suit with striped formal trousers, grey waistcoat and necktie for daytime concerts and a formal tailcoat, striped formal trousers, and white waistcoat and bow tie for evening performances, while the women have chosen their own formal black concert attire. Vivienne Westwood and her design partner and husband, Andreas Kronthaler, who are known for their nonconformist yet historically inspired fashion, have redesigned and modernized the traditional day and evening suits with contemporary functionally in mind. The designers have also created a first-ever Philharmonic ladies suit for both day and evening concerts.
The new suits are tailored in the traditional cut of Savile Row Bespoke and feature a modern black cutaway jacket, worn in lieu of the tailcoat, paired with the traditional striped trousers and waistcoat. For day concerts, the men will wear a silver-grey waistcoat and tie embroidered with the Vienna Philharmonic logo, and for evening concerts, a white waistcoat and bow tie inspired by a classic white-tie suit. The ladies suit features a black collarless coat and slim-cut trousers. For day concerts, the suit is paired with a silver-grey top that complements the men’s day suits, and for evening, a black silk top.
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PBS GREAT PERFORMANCES BROADCAST
FROM VIENNA: THE NEW YEAR’S CELEBRATION 2017
January 1, 2017 at 2:30 pm and 7:30 pm ET on THIRTEEN WNET in New York (check local listings)
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
Vienna Singverein Concert Choir
Gustavo Dudamel, Conductor
Julie Andrews, Host
FRANZ VON SUPPE Queen of Spades, Overture (Pique Dame)
C.M. ZIEHRER Right This Way, Waltz – Ballet
OTTO NICOLAI Moon Chorus
OTTO NICOLAI The Merry Wives of Windsor
JOHANN STRAUSS Pepita Polka
JOHANN STRAUSS The Extravagant, Waltz
JOHANN STRAUSS, SR Indian Galop
JOSEF STRAUSS The Nasswald Forest Maiden, Ländler
JOHANN STRAUSS Let’s Dance, Quick Polka – Ballet
JOHANN STRAUSS A Thousand and One Nights, Waltz
JOHANN STRAUSS Tick Tock Quick Polka
EDUARD STRAUSS With Pleasure! Quick Polka
JOHANN STRAUSS On the Beautiful Blue Danube, Waltz
JOHANN STRAUSS, SR Radetzky March
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