Special

Special: Salieri 2025

27. February 2025

Anyone who knows the composer Antonio Salieri merely as a supposed rival of Mozart will have a chance to change this in 2025. In connection with the 200th anniversary of Salieri’s death and his upcoming 275th birthday, we take a fresh look here at the man whom we have to thank for today’s mdw.

Report

40 Years of EMp at the mdw

To mark the Elemental Music Education (EMp) programme’s 40 years of existence at the mdw, 29 November 2024 witnessed an anniversary celebration in which EMp faculty members provided wide-ranging impressions of their field in its development, breadth, and significance.

Report

Jennifer Batten at the mdw

On 29 October 2024, ipop hosted a workshop with the American rock guitarist Jennifer Batten. In a field dominated largely by men, Batten is surely one of the best-known and most successful women—and her renown extends beyond the confines of the guitar community.

Report

New Experiences through New Streaming Technologies

For years, the mdw has been a leader in the testing and implementation of new streaming technologies. Considerable technological investment and quite some willingness to experiment on the part of all those involved are necessary in order to make possible and utilise high-quality audio and video transfer with the lowest possible latency for concerts, for remote lessons, and especially for musicians playing together live in different locations.

Music

Alumni in Focus: Paul Müller

Ever since he was very little, Paul Müller has been fascinated by singing and by theatre. And to this day, the Austrian-Swiss unites these two passions—winning over audiences when he takes the stage as a singer and actor and demonstrating his pedagogical prowess as a school textbook author and secondary school teacher as well as in his position as a senior artist for voice-related subjects at the Max Reinhardt Seminar and lecturer at the Antonio Salieri Department.

Music

A Diary of Humanity

The 2024/25 winter semester saw baritone Thomas Hampson give a master class on Mahler interpretation at the mdw in collaboration with the Center for Research on Gustav Mahler and Viennese Modernism. Hampson, doubtless one of the foremost singers of our time, met Daniel Ender for a chat in the cafeteria on Lothringerstraße.

Music

Experiencing Music History on Location

Why is it occasionally worthwhile to put aside your learning materials, leave the lecture hall, and experience history right where it was made? At first glance, university-level music students—frequently under enormous pressure to work and practice—would seem to have near-zero latitude for field trips. But it’s precisely these that can make a crucial difference: they make it possible to experience history.

Music

Alumni in Focus: wienerwald festival

Three performance programme graduates, one idea: it was in 2023 that Manuel Egger, Magdalena Pramhaas, and Sabrina Reheis-Rainer joined forces to found the wienerwald festival [Vienna Woods Festival], a series of events that unite music with nature in unique concert formats at interesting locations.

Drama

Allowing Room for Error – Role Development at the Max Reinhardt Seminar Florentina Finder

Elizabeth Blonzen has been teaching the subject of Role Development at the Max Reinhardt Seminar since October 2024. In the following, the actor and playwright tells mdw Magazine why Vienna is the ideal city for actors, how one goes about cultivating courageous acting personalities, and why people at the Max Reinhardt Seminar might allow each other a little something more.

Drama

“Intimacy coordination creates meaningful scenes within actors’ boundaries”

Actor Katharina Haudum also works as an intimacy coordinator— in which capacity she has been teaching the course Intimacy Coordination and Consent-Based Practice at the Max Reinhardt Seminar since the summer semester of 2024. She recently provided mdw Magazine with intriguing insights into her work.

Drama

An Interview with Ute Lemper: “No matter where you land, keep on searching“

In her recently published book Die Zeitreisende [Time Traveler], global star Ute Lemper describes her unusual journey as an artist—including the years she spent at the Max Reinhardt Seminar. The reading tour of this multiple award-winning actor, singer, dancer, and author included a stop in Vienna, where she joined us at the Seminar for this interview.

Drama

SPOTLIGHT ON: The Max Reinhardt Seminar’s New Leading Team

Alexandra Althoff, dramaturge and former artistic director of the Burgtheater, assumed leadership of the mdw’s Max Reinhardt Seminar on 1 March 2024. She and Steffen Jäger, who serves as her deputy head, speak about these new responsibilities, the challenges and planned emphases during their term in office.

Film

The Annual Showcase of Film Academy Vienna

Film Academy Vienna’s “Werkschau”, a showcase event that gives its students the opportunity to present their projects to a wide audience on a big screen, takes place once each year. The Gartenbaukino, the Stadtkino Wien, and the mdw’s own Art House Cinema treat the general public to a multifaceted three-day programme comprised of feature-length and short films by Film Academy students from various degree programmes and semesters.

Film

Les funambules du son direct

In a film industry somehow capable of rescuing itself from crisis to crisis, as part of which its magic is being systematically stripped away layer by layer, location sound has a smaller and smaller role to play. It has separated from filmmaking as such to become something like a peculiar accessory of the film industry.

Film

Green Filming: How the Film Industry Helps Protect Our Climate

“Green filming” refers to measures taken as part of film production that aim to reduce CO₂ output and conserve resources. The film industry’s environmental footprint is a large one: film teams travel to all kinds of locations, equipment needs to be transported, and set elements as well as costumes need to be made—all of which results in large amounts of waste as well as high energy consumption. Recent years, however, have seen a shift in attitudes.

Research

mdwHistory: “Every German must read it” – Erwin Weill and the mdw

Das Haus der Träumer; Indische Flamme; Kronprinz Rudolf. Das Leben eines merkwürdigen Mannes. These are but a few of the works from the prolific pen of Viennese writer Erwin Weill, an oeuvre whose creation was abruptly cut short by the National Socialist regime and whose creator lost his life at the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1945.

Research

Review: Higher Music Education and Employability in a Neoliberal World

This volume, edited by mdw scholars Rainer Prokop and Rosa Reitsamer, presents an excellent collection of articles that critically examine how neoliberalism has shaped recent changes in music education policies and programmes.

Research

Early Stage Researchers: The Turntable as a Tool for Artistic Research

Eine Vielzahl von Künstler_innen, Musiker_innen und Komponist_innen haben den Plattenspieler in den letzten Jahrzehnten intensiv genutzt, bearbeitet und erweitert. Durch virtuos angewandte Techniken, wie u. a. Scratching und Beat-Matching, wurde der Plattenspieler zum Instrument und der bzw. die DJ zum/zur Musiker_in.

Research

Early Stage Researchers: Performers as Commissioners of New Music

It all began a few years ago with a clarinet concerto by the American composer Aaron Copland (1900–1990). My eye was caught by the words at the very top of the page: “For Benny Goodman”. Was Copland friends with the swing icon? Did they work together? Or did the composer simply admire Goodman (1909–1986) as a musician?

Music

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