I waltzed through meticulously landscaped and manicured gardens, which I knew because someone had drawn on the score of Johann Strauss II that the piano teacher had taught me to play for a regional competition for young performers. I smelled the perfume of more than two hundred species of roses at once, and I marveled at the buzzing of bees and the whirring of hoverflies, and how the score ofThe Blue Danube I had captured that rhythm; until I had to take the guidebook out of my backpack and investigate where such a fabulous amount of pollinating fauna came from.
In the city of Vienna, the green left has visibly governed. Every few meters of any of its impressive parks, a patch of fallow land is allowed to peek out—and insects are allowed to roam freely. Not only that: on the rooftops of public buildings (and many private ones, like our hotel), they don't install swimming pools or excessive solar panels for profit, but rather home-made ones. They dedicate them to sustainable urban beekeeping, which employs both individuals and groups and associations, who then sell the exquisite honey to local customers and visitors like me. The hymenoptera, for their part, work with the city's gardeners to ensure the well-being of all things green. I imagine what Palma would be like, with bees and rosebushes.
In other respects, things are more or less the same as we Viennese. We smoke with the thirty-year-old sound technician, who explains that he works in sound design for theater and music (and feels very lucky). His parents could only buy him a cheap guitar and send him to learn with the nun who teaches catechism: "If I hadn't gone that way, I'd be an artist now," he says, "or maybe not—it's really hard work." I'm reminded again of that girl who, with great difficulty, paid for lessons for almost ten years and was given a Casio. In the hometown of the author of the Czerny method, there's a big business in music, but the money is only seen by a few, as always. Daniel tells us about scandals over the pittance paid to young orchestral performers; and about the very few opportunities, spaces, and programs to pursue other styles.
As we listen to him, he notices that we are looking up at the magnificent building in front of us: a neoclassical façade, enormous windows, very high ceilings, and not a single light on or sign of daily life. Half of those downtown apartments are empty, he confirms. They belong to wealthy people who only stay there temporarily, because they usually live in the outskirts; to foreigners who occasionally come to the opera; or to more general tourist rentals, through platforms. He is lucky (again), because his best friend and coworker has inherited the apartment they live in. Strauss composed the waltz Life of an artist along with the famous order. "Happy is he who can forget what he cannot change," he said. We put out our cigarettes in one of the super-convenient municipal ashtrays. The streets are so clean, it seems natural to waltz by.
Then I notice the little bag tied to the lamppost: it contains copies of Die Presse, and it keeps them out of the rain. The sound technician notices and asks us to dedicate ourselves to it, in addition to music. It's a bunch of things, but we're very lucky because we all like them and they connect: researching, thinking, experimenting. I didn't finish classical studies, and I often miss the mark, but, like Beethoven, I believe that only a lack of passion is inexcusable. One of the jobs I do, I mention, is writing for a weekly magazine, and you'll surely appear in my next article. Daniel confesses that he no longer reads on paper. In 2023, they stopped printing the magazine. Wiener Zeitung, one of the oldest regional newspapers in the world, which had only been in operation between 1939 and 1945, banned by the Nazis. It was what he trusted most; but now that it's gone digital, it publishes the same content as any other. It happens at home too, we reply. And so, he asks what type of media I write for, and what about.
I'm interrupted by the thought that the concert will go well, because the technician seems like a nice guy. We've been together for six hours, setting up, talking, testing, smoking. Like us, he pauses for a moment every time a crow cries, and becomes enthralled with a rose, or a bee sipping champagne. He's part of that rhythm that still moves the souls of the city. I wanted to explain to him that this is a project in my language, with journalists who take their work seriously, despite the scarcity of resources, a small one; and that I'm writing as an act of resistance, of subversion, to reflect deeply with those who dedicate time to reading and literature. But the stage councilor comes out and warns us: there are ten minutes left until the concert. And we still haven't eaten anything.
