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Downtown Vienna follows Pope Silvester's instructions with particular enthusiasm. The romantic alleys, elegant shopping streets and squares are metamorphosed into a pulsing party arena. Thousands of people follow the New Year's Eve Trail, stopping off for sparkling wine, punch and snacks as they make their way from one attraction to the next, from City Hall to Teinfaltstrasse, Freyung and Hoher Markt. There are marquees, live performances and entertainment all over the place, and the louder it gets, the more confident the people of Vienna can be that the evil spirits are being driven out. Music, of course, is a favorite way of making noise: from waltzes and dancefloor to oldies and folk music. In front of the Opera House there is a bank of video screens showing popular operettas.

Those who want to take off into the New Year in romantic style should have a ride in one of the old carriages of the Giant Ferris Wheel at the Prater, where from the top overlooking the illuminated panorama of Vienna, they can greet the New Year with a glass of sparkling wine. For the energetic there's the chance to jog into the New Year on a 5.4 km course along the Ring boulevard past the monumental architecture for which Vienna is famed.

A more romantic way of ringing in the New Year is to view the lights of the city from the Danube. DDSG Blue Danube offers boat trips on the river where passengers can celebrate in more sedate fashion away from the hurly-burly while still being within earshot of the action-and dancing the night away if they wish to do so. Or you can take a free shuttlebus to the Cobenzl, a hill on Vienna's fringe providing the best view of all the fireworks, to welcome the New Year and savor mouthwatering delicacies at food stalls.

But there is much more to New Year's Eve in Vienna. You will also find cabaret and karaoke, magicians, palm-readers, fortune-tellers and the old tradition of interpreting the future by examining the forms taken on by molten lead when it is dropped into cold water.

As midnight approaches, the masses migrate towards St. Stephen's Cathedral. Just before the old year comes to an end, the music stops and the countdown begins, culminating in the booming chimes of the 'Pummerin' from the cathedral bell tower, to the accompaniment of Strauss's Blue Danube Waltz as midnight passes. Then the sparkling wine corks pop and complete strangers joyfully wish each other a Happy New Year full of luck and happiness. And to get the year off to a good start, the crowds carry on partying until the early hours of the morning.

The renowned Imperial Ball in the Hofburg ballroom is a time for rustling ball gowns, glistening jewelry and the imperial majesty of the Austro-Hungarian Empire of yore. Just as the Habsburgs used to celebrate the New Year, a gala dinner complete with liveried lackeys marks the start of a night of waltzing, culminating at midnight in a performance by the outstanding dancers and singers of Vienna's two opera houses.

The New Year's Gala in the magnificent Festsaal of Vienna's City Hall is also an elegant event. Waltzing melodies performed by a ball orchestra, the debutantes of the season and their escorts, a sublime international buffet and the official welcome of the New Year from the state balcony prove once more that Vienna is a center of sophisticated savoir vivre.

The fact that Vienna remains a center of elegance and refinement is also borne out by the balls and galas held at the city's deluxe hotels, organized with all the old-world charm of a bygone era.

Needless to say, Vienna also does full justice to its reputation as the city of music, and New Year's Eve and New Year's Day concerts make for a harmonious start to the year. The Wiener Symphoniker, Wiener Hofburgorchester and Wiener Ring-Ensemble, the Tonkünstler-Orchester Niederösterreich, the Strauss Festival Orchestra and the Wiener Residenzorchester, to mention just a few, offer music at its finest.

The most reputed event, of course, is the New Year's Day Concert by the Vienna Philharmonic, which is heard every year by a billion people throughout the world. It was first staged in 1941 and has been conducted since then by all the world's most famous conductors. In recent years Zubin Mehta, Lorin Maazel, Riccardo Muti, Seiji Ozawa and Nikolaus Harnoncourt have led the orchestra in the flower-adorned Golden Hall of the Musikverein in the popular program of Strauss melodies. Tickets for this world-famous event are worth their weight in gold. Apart from the fact that reservations for the next concert have to arrive in Vienna on the first working day of the New Year, tickets are allocated by lottery. All that the Philharmonic can do is to wish applicants good luck!

In spite of the many attractions that New Year's Eve offers throughout the city, many people prefer to celebrate the New Year wining, dining and dancing in the more intimate setting of their own homes. At midnight, however, as soon as the chimes of the 'Pummerin' have sounded through the open window or from the radio, everyone drinks to each other's health, wishes each other good luck and presents each other with lucky trinkets in the form of pigs, clover, lucky bags or ladybugs that are mostly carried around in the purse for the rest of the year. Many people go out onto the street and set off firecrackers or rockets. And then there is the tradition of fortune-telling with lead: a small piece of lead is heated over a flame and plunged into cold water. The shapes that form as a result are then interpreted. A rounded heart, for example, is a sure sign of winning everybody's heart in the coming year.

After midnight, many people serve up special New Year's Eve dishes like lentil salad and pigs head. The first is supposed to bring financial blessing for the coming year, while the second means a fat and therefore lucky year. Happy New Year!

Article: Author: Hanne Egghardt
Article sent to us by: Lorraine S.

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