15 February: The Blue Danube

On this date in 1867 Johann Strauss' Blue Danube Waltz was played for the first time at a public concert in Vienna, Austria. 10 things you might not know about this piece of Music.

1. Today, we're familiar with this as an instrumental piece, but the original version performed on 15 February 1867 had words. It was written for a four part choir and was performed at a concert of the Vienna Men's Choral Association. See below for an English translation of the first verse.
2. Strauss was first commissioned to write a choral piece in 1865, but he didn't get around to starting it then because he was so busy.
3. The impetus for him to get cracking on his commission was the Seven Weeks’ War in 1866. Austria was defeated by Prussia, so there was an economic depression and low morale among the people of Vienna. Strauss was encouraged to revisit his commission and write a joyful waltz song to help lift people's spirits.
4. He was inspired by a poem by Karl Isidor Beck, who'd ended each stanza with ‘By the Danube, beautiful blue Danube’.
5. At the time the piece was written, the Danube didn't flow through Vienna. It's never been Blue, either!
6. Josef Weyl, a member of the Choral Society, added some humorous lyrics poking fun at the war, the bankrupt city and its politicians.
7. Reception of the choral piece was lukewarm. At the time Strauss's reaction was "The devil take the Waltz, my only regret is for the coda - I wish that had been a success!"
8. The orchestral version was played later in the year at the World's Fair in Paris, and also in New York. It was heard for the first time in Britain at the promenade concerts in Covent Garden in September.
9. On New Year's Eve in Vienna, the waltz is broadcast on television and radio stations at midnight. It's also a regular piece at the Vienna New Year's Day Concert.
10. In popular culture, its best known appearance is probably in the Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, in the scene in which a spaceplane docks with a space station. Kubrick made an association between the spinning motion of the satellites and people dancing waltzes.

Danube so blue, 

so bright and blue,

through vale and field

you flow so calm,

our Vienna greets you,

your silver stream

through all the lands

you merry the heart

with your beautiful shores.

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