Tonight's program is a symphonic journey,
touching down in seven different countries,
and with the help of video and music,
we'll gain an appreciation for how 19th-century Europe
helped shape the beautiful world that we live in today.
The theme of the concert is Romanticism and Nationalism.
Nearly all the music we'll hear today
is from about the same generation,
from the late 1800s, from the Romantic Age,
and this music championed national causes
and it also supported this exciting notion
of common people finally taking the reins in their society.
From Norway to Italy, from England to the Czech Republic.
We'll start in Austria with a Habsburg waltz.
You know, the Habsburgs were really the energy
and the elegance of the day.
And in the 1860s, it was the cultural peak of that empire
and the waltz was all the craze.
The Habsburgs ruled a vast empire
and they were great patrons of the arts.
That's why Mozart and Beethoven and Strauss,
and all these great composers, went to Vienna
to create all that beautiful music.
Strauss was the heartthrob of the Romantic Age in Vienna.
With his violin, he could whip up the crowds into a frenzy
and he helped create that waltz craze.
This piece gives us the sense of the pride and the joy of Vienna.
It is by Johann Strauss, Jr., his number one hit of 1867,
"On the Beautiful Blue Danube."