As is customary with the New Year’s Day concert tradition, Welsh National Opera’s Return to Vienna concert series features many Viennese Waltzes throughout its programme. A mainstay in dance, music and film, we take a look at the Viennese Waltz’s popular role and its influence on pop culture today.
1: Tchaikovsky’s The Sleeping Beauty / Disney’s Sleeping Beauty
Tchaikovsky’s ballet The Sleeping Beauty (1890) makes great use of many different dances throughout, including a grand waltz. Act I of the ballet brings together the whole ballet company to dance the Grande valse villageoise (also known as The Garland Waltz), a large ensemble dance to celebrate Princess Aurora’s sixteenth birthday in the royal court. The music was later used in Walt Disney’s Sleeping Beauty (1959) and was given lyrics by Jack Lawrence and Sammy Fain. The song Once Upon a Dream is sung by Princess Aurora and Prince Philip, and sees the pair meet for the first time.
2: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
During Harry Potter’s fourth year at Hogwarts, Harry, Ron and Hermione spend the year alongside pupils from the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang international wizarding schools to compete to win the Triwizard Tournament. The Yule Ball that celebrates the coming together of the magical community is held on Christmas Eve, and Harry is horrified to hear that as a Triwizard school champion, he will have to open the ball alongside the other champions and their dance partners. After a quick scramble to find partners, Harry and Ron begrudgingly go to the ball where a grand waltz kicks off the festivities. Scottish composer Patrick Doyle’s Potter Waltz is now a concert hall favourite, regularly heard on the radio, and is a joyous highlight in the film where events take a dark turn for Harry and his friends.
3: Strictly Come Dancing
The Viennese Waltz is a frequently appearing dance on BBC Strictly Come Dancing. The 2021 show champions, Rose Ayling-Ellis and Giovanni Pernice, performed a Viennese Waltz to Alicia Keys’s Fallin' and subsequently gained the joint-highest score of the series for the dance. The dance itself is graceful and appears effortless, calling for an extended long neck, many transitions in and out of hold, and quick moving through the dancefloor. Its emotive storytelling portrays a romantic break-up, the opening showing the pair communicating through British Sign-Language before launching into the waltz – the first time that BSL was featured in a Strictly dance routine.
To hear the original masters of the Viennese Waltz in concert and enjoy the likes of Johann Strauss II’s Blue Danube and the Myrtle Blossoms waltzes, join us for WNO Orchestra’s Return to Vienna concerts, touring around Wales and England between 5 – 21 January 2023.