Divamensch

FRI AUG 15

We met up at 8am-ish and decided to go over to our destination part of town and find breakfast there. I found a promising place called Ma Makers and wow, it was so good. Scott had a cream cheese and cucumber sandwich, served on some nice dark bread with lovely pickled onions on the top. A soft boiled egg on the side. I had syrniki, farm cottage cheese mini pancakes with crème fraîche and house-made seasonal jam. Amazing. I’m finding a recipe when I get home and adding it to my breakfast repertoire (which is fully loaded as it is).

 

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The highlight of breakfast was this exchange between Scott and a pretty young woman who worked there. She brought him the coffee he had ordered and accurately read his body language - - he wanted something else.

 

HER: Yes? Is there something else you want?

SCOTT: Yes, could I have some milk please?

HER: It is not recommended, but yes.

 

Can you stand it.

 

We went over to a visitors center and I bought a 48-hour Salzburg pass (Scott had bought a pass the day before). Our first stop was the funicular up the mountain to the fortress. The funicular was fun, as they always are.

 

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I told Scott about my Aunt Kat and Uncle Dave who lived in Dubuque early in their marriage. There was a funicular in Dubuque which fascinated me as a kid. Would you believe Scott had been on that funicular?

 

We walked around the fortress for a while, did the museum, took it all in. At least the parts that interested us. Take the best and leave the rest, is that how it goes? Just being up there and walking around the pebbly, sun-baked streets, that was a cultural experience in itself. The views, of course, were extraordinary.

 

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Scott took this fantastic panorama shot:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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My phone started taking pictures that I didn’t intend to take. Does yours do that? I deleted most of them but think these are pretty cool. These are random people in the museum:

 

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And a couple pictures of me and Scott in a cool shady alley. The picture of Scott with pretzel is a masterpiece of the genre.

 

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It’s always fun people watching. This dad and son were the cutest.

 

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The palace tour was a snooze but Scott took this cute picture of me in a kooky doorway.

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Scott asked a friendly, English-speaking guard if it was true that we could walk to the modern art museum. He said yes, it was mostly shady and would be a pleasant walk on a hot day like that one. He warned us that the hill going down to the path was steep. He wasn’t kidding, it was billy goat steep. I don’t often get a chance to use the word “perilous” but this would be the time.

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The walk was indeed mostly shady and pleasant. We were shocked to see people actually live up there.

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It was crazy seeing the castle from a distance and realizing we had been there a half hour before.

 

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Two more pictures before we leave the walk:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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We arrived at the modern art museum and decided to get lunch first. I checked in with the host, an older gentleman.

 

HIM: Hallo.

ME: Hallo. Ein Tafel für zwei, bitte. [Hello. A table for two, please.]

HIM: Of course. [he motioned to the tables behind him, on the patio]

ME: We’d prefer to eat inside.

HIM: Really? It’s cooler outside.

[pause]

ME: We’d prefer to eat inside. Is that possible?

HIM: Of course it is possible. This way, please.

 

Neither of us believed for a minute that it was cooler outside. I think he saw us in our shorts and thought the patio was the place for us, he was afraid we would bring the dining room down in terms of class. I think we did OK and really, if they have a no-shorts policy in the dining room, we would have obeyed that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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We had a bit more sneering from our waiter when we ordered soup, the burrata salad, and a shared side dish - - but no entrée. He was even a little brusque! The place was not very busy and honestly not super rarefied or elegant, it didn’t feel right that they’d be so hoity toity.

 

That said (an expression I loathe) our lunch was delicious. Scott prefaced the soup with the funniest comment made by either of us on the trip:

 

SCOTT: I want to order the gazpacho but am afraid I’m going to say Gestapo!

 

My burrata salad had a nice big glob of burrata mozzarella in the center and was surrounded by lovely cold roasted tomatoes, fresh basil, and something else I don’t remember. We had a great little basket of bread, served with olive oil and a little dish of spiced salt and pepper. Our shared side dish was a marvelous mushroom casserole situation, a very delicate flavor. We also got a carafe of cucumber mint water. Our secondary server (a delightful middle-aged woman, not the sneering younger man who took our order) had a little trouble pouring the water, it spilled on both ends. She apologized and laughed, in German.

 

The modern art museum appeared to be a contemporary art museum, all three exhibits were brand new. We weren’t wowed by any of it but were amused by the bronze replica of “Jane Fonda’s Original Stepper.”

 

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We finished up there and took the elevator down to street level. No more stairs or hills, please. We took an Uber back to the hotel, took a nap, showered, changed, and went back to that part of town for dinner and Opera #3.

 

We didn’t have loads of time so we got sausages from a food truck. I had bratwurst with a big pool of dijon mustard, Scott had curry sausage, which was wonderfully spicy.

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We saw this gorgeous doorway down the block:

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The opera was *One Morning Turns Into an Eternity,* a triple bill of Viennese pieces from the early 20th century: Schoenberg’s one-woman opera *Erwartung,* Webern’s *Five Pieces for Orchestra,* and the final movement from Mahler’s *Das Lied von der Erde,* “Der Abschied.”

 

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We’d never heard of either of the singers (Ausrine Stundtye for the Schoenberg, Fleur Barron for the Mahler) but were drawn to the director (Peter Sellars), the conductor (Esa-Pekka Salonen), and the orchestra (the Vienna Phil). Here's a picture of the set:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Schoenberg is a portrait of a woman unhinged. Typically she wanders around a forest, calling out to her lover, looking for him, and then stumbles upon his dead body at the end. Eek! Sellars upended things by starting (before the music started) by having two men deliver a body bag to the woman. And to add insult to injury, they asked her to sign off on a form, confirming she had received it. The body bag was dumped unceremoniously on the floor. So in the moments when she’s calling out to her lover and asking where he is, you know she’s coo coo for Cocoa Puffs.

 

Maybe Stundtye doesn’t have the most beautiful voice but she was great for this. She leaned into the expressionism but also did a gorgeous job with the many lyric moments. Best of all, she, Salonen, and the Vienna Phil performed it so it made sense. It’s a highly fragmented piece but their performance made it all hang together.

 

The short Webern pieces were a perfect choice to transition between the sound worlds of the Schoenberg and the Mahler. The Webern is more chilly in its approach, it felt like a piquant rhubarb sorbet between the two other courses. Again with the rhubarb.

 

I was less familiar with the Mahler than with the Schoenberg, I think I’d only heard it once before (I’d heard the Schoenberg three or four times). At first blush you might not think it would be a good pairing with the Schoenberg - - that piece is relentlessly unhinged and the Mahler is warm and melancholy. It has a profound sadness but the music is somehow imbued with an undercurrent of humanity and hope. The woman is suffering but you know she’s going to get through it.

 

Barron sang it like a dream, she has just the glowing yet dark sound you want in a Mahler mezzo. It was interesting seeing how much textual overlap there was between the two pieces, both dealing with loss and death and trying to find a way to move on. Sellars wove these connections into the staging: both women addressed the same body bag, both moved about the stage in similar patterns, both wore black dresses. I found a possible deeper connection that might not have been intended: the Schoenberg woman makes a few references to her lover having been with another woman. I thought maybe the woman in the Mahler was the other woman…? I’d like to ask Sellars if that was his concept. Anyone know how I can get ahold of him?

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