1 January 2023

New Year’s music

By James Conner

Finding a performance of Johann Strauss I’s Radetsky March on YouTube is easy. Find one that can be embedded in a web page, and that has high sound quality, is not. This production has interesting visuals, but too much bass. Try the 2019 performance of the Vienna Philharmonic, Christian Thielemann conducting, for better sound.

Field Marshal Johann Josef Wenzel Anton Franz Karl, Graf Radetzky von Radetz was 82 in 1848 when he won his greatest victory, the Battle of Custoza, the effective end of the first war for Italian independence. Not until after two more wars would Italy be unified.

While working on the instrumentation for the performance of the march, which was commissioned to commemorate Radetz'’s victory at Custoza Strauss I caught scarlet fever and died three days later.

The Radetsky March is the tradition encore for the New Year’s Day concert in Vienna. The audience claps as directed by the conductor.