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This Valentine’s day, spread a little love over to radio klassik Stephansdom. This Thursday, February 13, the Vienna-based classical music station will be conducting their first formal fundraiser of 2025, and it’s a worthwhile donation.

I’ve been meaning for some time to write a little about the Stephansdom itself and its curious appeal to me. As the photograph above indicates, it’s impossible to see the entire cathedral from a single perspective; asymmetrical and a hodgepodge of architectural styles from paganism to the Romanesque, Baroque, and Gothic, it is still not complete and probably never will be; its history stretches from the legendary marriage of Kriemhild and Etzel in the early 13th century Nibelungenlied to its bombing by allied forces in 1945. The curiosa of the cathedral — the phallus and vulva atop columns on either side of the Giant’s Door; the soaring South Tower and its dwarf North Tower; the stone pulpit, with a stone self-portrait of the sculptor at its base; the extraordinary chapels; the tomb of Emperor Frederick III — testify to its long history, a history spiced with tragedy and wit. But what all of this represents to me is extraordinary sacredness, a sacredness of the spirit and the human body itself. Though originally located just outside of the city’s walls, it has come to represent at least the symbolic center of Vienna, a city that for quite some time was at the eastern edge of Christendom itself. In my many visits there I’ve found it inexhaustible as both history and inspiration; it makes one want to turn Catholic, almost. One day I hope my German will be good enough to enjoy Reinhard Gruber’s new book about the cathedral, which looks like just the thing for a rainy afternoon.

Herr Christoph Wellner and the rest of the fine staff over at radio klassik Stephansdom would appreciate your support — and, for Valentine’s Day, a little financial love. The station plans a full day of on-air festivities this Thursday, February 13, so make a donation, sit back, and enjoy the best of the Austrian capital. Below a few notes on radio klassik Stephansdom, which I posted here in late 2023.


Many years ago, when my father was in his 50s and 60s and I was in my teens and 20s, we used to sit together in the evenings and listen to WFLN, Philadelphia’s classical music radio station. For 24 hours a day, mellifluous, plummy-voiced disc jockeys (an unfortunate coinage, that) introduced the masterpieces and less-than-masterpieces of classical music, occasionally interrupted with a commercial break. Founded in 1949, for the first four decades of its existence it barely broke even, but that didn’t much matter; the station’s owners, families by the name of Smith and Green, weren’t particularly interested in turning a profit, only providing music to the city and its environs. In the late 1980s, however, the station’s ownership changed, and in an effort to turn a profit several programming changes were introduced. Instead of playing full symphonies and chamber music works, one got a movement of one, then a movement of another; many of those mellifluous voices were fired; and in 1997 the station finally turned to a pop music format. Announcing the ownership change on the air, Greater Media CEO Tom Milewski rationalized the decision, saying, “Classical music, is, we feel, best presented in a non-commercial context” — a context which wasn’t Greater Media’s, nor was it of many other station owners.  So ended WFLN’s nearly half-century run, a run which had provided my father and myself a unique education in classical music.

There is of course still such a thing as classical music radio; here in New York, WQXR offers it, but fragmenting full compositions just as WFLN did in its later years. And streaming music services offer extraordinarily full libraries of classical music recordings and even live events (my preference is for iDagio and Deutsche Grammophon’s Stage+ service), with splendid sound reproduction through their FLAC formats. But I still miss classical music radio itself: knowledgable voices offering not only context but also companionship, the awareness that there’s another person at the other end of the connection, listening to the music at the same time as you were: a musical bond between these listeners, distance obliterated in an aesthetic experience.

Well, not any more. Recently I stumbled upon radio klassik Stephansdom, a radio station that airs in Vienna at 107.3 FM but streams as well, not only through their web site but through several other internet radio services. I’m not sure why I haven’t come across it before — this year the station celebrated its 25th anniversary — but I’m listening to it even now. (An extra appeal is that I get to practice listening to German, too — I’ve taken the language up again.)

The more I learned about it, the more impressed I was. radio klassik Stephansdom was founded in 1998 as the brainchild of Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, who himself flipped the switch in the Archbishop’s Palace in Vienna on September 24 of that year; “Shortly afterwards the Danube Waltz sounded, followed by greetings and blessings from Pope John Paul II,” according to the Google translation of this Archdiocesian web page about the anniversary.

Although rkS is funded and operated by the Archdiocese, in 2025 it looks like the station will be on its own. I must say that I find this a little sad. As might be expected, radio klassik Stephansdom’s music programming runs a little more towards the spiritual than the secular; not a surprise, especially when much great music of the past 500 years, from Machaut to Messiaen (whose 115th birthday was yesterday), was inspired by religious faith. The secular, however, also appears on the station’s playlists; just yesterday, rkS played Bizet’s Carmen with Maria Callas in the title role, a celebration of the 100th anniversary of Callas’s birth.

I will be visiting Vienna little later this month and plan a visit to the Stephansdom with my kids, of course — it’s a site that can’t be missed, especially over the Christmas season. But over the past few days I’ve been imagining and envisioning the Stephansdom as I listen to some of the music that inspired its construction and has resonated in its halls, not to mention the religious, Christian faith that its architecture and that music reflects. Christoph Wellner, the editor-in-chief of rkS, claims as his area of responsibility: “To form a foundation for passing on the Christian message with the most beautiful music — on the radio, on the Internet, in the diocese, in Austria and worldwide.” Herr Wellner can consider it passed on to me.

You can listen to the station from anywhere in the world through their web site here. And below is the full Google translation of this page from the Archdiocese of Vienna, published there in September of this year, filling out the picture a little bit.


25 years ago, on September 24, 1998, “radio klassik Stephansdom” (then still “Radio Stephansdom”) went on air for the first time. At twelve o’clock sharp, Cardinal Christoph Schönborn activated the start control at a ceremony in the Archbishop’s Palace in Vienna, shortly afterwards the Danube Waltz sounded, followed by greetings and blessings from Pope John Paul II.

In its current edition, the Viennese church newspaper “Der Sonntag” recalls its beginnings a good quarter of a century ago. Austria was the last country in Europe to allow private radio, and only after a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights, which found the right to freedom of expression to be incompatible with a broadcasting monopoly. Ten radio licenses were advertised, for which there were 150 interested parties. Originally, church broadcasters were excluded from the private radio law. This had to be changed after a complaint.

The then head of the public relations office of the Archdiocese of Vienna, Wolfgang Bergmann, and his employees saw the opportunity for a private church radio. Cardinal Christoph Schönborn immediately agreed to it, as he knew of private church radios from France.

In June 1997, the application for a license for the Vienna area was submitted. “In the entire free world, churches are not denied the opportunities of radio, I don’t know why it should be any different in Austria,” said Cardinal Schönborn in a broadcast at the time. The plan was a non-commercial special interest radio that would not be profit-oriented, but would cover its costs through income. The license application stated about the content: “The program wants to invite the listener to pause for a moment and recharge their batteries in the hustle and bustle of the day. It should be an oasis for the ears and soul for radio listeners, away from the constant hustle and bustle and without noisy disc jockeys.”

The archdiocese requested the frequency 107.3. In the spring of 1998, work began on converting a former student shared apartment on the top floor of the Teutonic Order House in downtown Vienna into office space. July 1st was the first day of work for the eight program designers at the time, three of whom are still in the team today: program director Christoph Wellner, editor Bernadette Spitzer and technician Martin Macheiner, who was there before everyone else during the renovation and therefore has personnel number 001. The first editor-in-chief and the decisive role in shaping the radio’s fortunes were in the hands of Anton Gatnar until 2014, who also took over management a little later. The current station manager is Roman Gerner.

Radio faces new economic challenges in the future. Since the Archdiocese of Vienna is planning significant savings in its own media sector, from 2025 the station will have to operate entirely on its own without any diocesan subsidy.

The “radio klassik Stephansdom” can now be received throughout Austria via DAB+. The station can be received terrestrially in Vienna on 107.3 and in Graz on 94.2. The number of listeners is around 200,000.

Sunday CD: Seelentrost

Among my recent enthusiasms has been the music of Heinrich Schütz, a prolific composer of primarily church music who flourished in German lands in the 17th century, during and just after the Thirty Years’ War. (As his career progressed, he was forced to compose for smaller and smaller ensembles — the result of the war’s decimation of the local population.)

There’s no shortage of recordings of his work, despite his relative marginalization anywhere but in early music circles. But in its February issue Gramophone bestows a laurel or two on Seelentrost (Perfect Noise), the debut album by soprano Isabel Schicketanz. Subtitled “The sound of inner life in Heinrich Schütz’ time,” her program features work not only by Schütz but also by many of his students, including the recovery of some fine work by Sophie Elisabeth (1613-1676).

Schicketanz plumbs the spiritual depths exemplified by these composers’ immersion in the Christian religion and in early Baroque practice with intent and unerring focus and power (as products of a Protestant theology, the language here is a Lutheran German rather than a Catholic Latin — without this, no German Enlightenment as I described the other day); her coda in the final minute of Adam Krueger’s “Der Liebe Macht herrscht Tag und Nacht” sends shivers down my spine.  Her accompanists are themselves subtle and precise, and Dr. Oliver Geisler’s liner notes provide an incisive and informative introduction to this obscure work:

Speaking of programme conception: with the works on this recording, Isabel Schicketanz takes a path that first leads us listeners into darkness, letting us explore the shadow regions of the soul. A second group of works, from Heinrich Schütz’s “Ich harrete des Herren” (“I waited patiently for the Lord”), portrays a person who lives and loves, who has tasted all aspects of life and can pass on these experiences (of life and faith). The third and final part begins with Heinrich Alberts “Dass alle Menschen sterben” (“That all people die”). The certainty of death is expressed, however, with the promise of coming salvation. A certain serenity can be heard, an inner smile and light that is built on deeper insights into life and the soul.

You can listen to the album through many streaming services, including Apple Classical; you can also hear it on YouTube, but for cryin’ out loud, the delicate work of Schicketanz and her colleagues demands better reproduction than your MacBook will provide. The CD is available from Challenge Records or perhaps an e-tailer near you.

For a deeper dive, the New York Times‘ Anthony Rommasini has more on Schütz here.

Sprechen Sie Deutsch?

Harry Kupfer’s 1979 production of Richard Wagner’s Der Fliegende Holländer at Bayreuth.

Last night I tried to get my blood pressure down (doctor’s orders) with a recording of Richard Wagner’s Der Fliegende Holländer, produced at Bayreuth in 1978 and taped in 1985. As it happened, it was one of those productions that, like Patrice Chereau’s Bayreuth Ring cycle conducted by Pierre Boulez at around the same time, attracted both praise and condemnation from the Festspielhaus’s devotees. John Gilks laid out the reason for this in 2011:

The concept is that the Dutchman exists only in Senta’s imagination. She is fixated on the Dutchman as her route out of the repressed bourgeois environment [in which] she is trapped. It’s a tormented, even hysterical, version of Senta. …

Onstage throughout the opera, Lisbeth Balslev is excellent and haunting as Senta; Simon Estes as the Dutchman is revelatory. Last night I caught the first half; tonight I conclude.

I’ve been more attracted than usual to vocal music and opera over the past few years, especially that of Austria and Germany; it follows a lifelong interest in what I suppose we can call the German Enlightenment, a 150-year period that stretches from Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason (1781) to Freud and Wittgenstein in the years before the First World War — over just slightly more than a century and slightly less than a single lifetime, German-speaking lands produced Goethe and Beethoven, Schopenhauer and Wagner, Thomas Mann and Mozart. In these dark times (as Karl Kraus called them), I could use a little more light, so I’m again reaching up to those higher shelves where I’ve been keeping The World as Will and Representation and Buddenbrooks.

And of course my vinyl collection awaits me — the Solti Ring and the Furtwängler Ninth. But first, down to my German homework — I’ve got a lesson on Monday.


If you’re playing along at home, I recommend Bryan Magee’s Aspects of Wagner, the best short introduction to the composer, and Barry Millington’s lengthier but more comprehensive look at the Sorcerer of Bayreuth. (Magee also is quite good on the relationship between Schopenhauer and Wagner in another book.) Kupfer’s Fliegende Holländer production and several other Bayreuth productions are streamable through Deutsche Grammophon’s Stage+ — a streamer I highly recommend as well.

Is it 1933 yet?

Rudolf Schlichter (1890–1955), Woman with Tie, ca. 1923. Oil on canvas. Private collection.

As we await history’s verdict on the events of the past week or so, we look forward to the next exhibition at New York’s Neue Galerie, Neue Sachlichkeit/New Objectivity, which opens at the Fifth Avenue museum on February 20. Running through May, the show, curated by Dr. Olaf Peters, who also curated the Neue Galerie’s fine Otto Dix and Degenerate Art exhibitions, throws a spotlight on one of my favorite artistic periods and celebrates the 100th anniversary of the groundbreaking 1925 exhibition curated by Gustav F. Hartlaub at the Kunsthalle Mannheim. (I note also that many of these artists were cited as “favorites” by R. Crumb, who shares not a few affinities with them.)

“Characterized by its critical realism, social commentary, and detailed depiction of contemporary life, and marking a significant departure from Expressionism’s emotional intensity … [the] Neue Sachlichkeit movement was divided by two philosophies — the unflinching and socially critical Verists, and the Classicists, who focused on harmony and beauty,” says the Neue Galerie:

The show will offer a wide-ranging perspective, exploring the tension between the Verists and the Classicists, which will be illustrated through a multidisciplinary installation, featuring paintings, sculpture, photography, decorative arts, works on paper, and film. … The presentation interprets these two camps as a coherent chapter in art history, focusing on the ways that the New Objectivity proponents mirrored the Weimar Republic’s cultural, political, and social complexities.

There may be no better time to reacquaint yourselves with this remarkable body of work; central to the art was the idea of the integrity of the individual, especially in an era of fluid gender presentation and representation (as evidenced by Schlichter’s Woman with Tie at the top of this item). Needless to add, the movement was crushed by Hitler’s seizure of authoritarian power in 1933; I tend to side with Peter Gay who saw this as a “Revenge of the Father,” as he put it in his 1968 book Weimar Culture, also worth a rereading. Indeed, why not read that, then enjoy the exhibition? It opens on February 20; tickets (which will be hard to come by, no doubt) are now available here.

I was right the first time

Jonathan Swift was right too.

On the day after the election in November, I published a post called “Republic of morons” here; after some due consideration, I removed it, feeling that perhaps it was a bit too harsh on any of those who might have voted for Donald J. Trump, a few of whom I know (and if you’re reading this, you know who you are too). After the events of the past few days, I regret its removal. Since Monday, the President of the United States has:

  • Destroyed the hopes of men, women, and children seeking asylum from war-torn, poverty-ridden, and (other) criminal governments
  • To quote the New York Times, issued an executive order that “effectively defines transgender Americans out of existence”
  • Mocked a bishop of the Episcopal Church who urged him to compassion for others
  • Removed the Spanish-language Web site for the executive branch
  • Cheerfully opened the corridors of power and  influence to a bunch of bullet-headed tech bros
  • Pardoned those who cheerfully and violently attacked police and security agents attempting to protect the nation’s legislative branch and its members
  • Bowed out of both the Paris Agreement on Climate Change and the World Health Organization

At the National Cathedral services yesterday, Mariann Budde, the Episcopal bishop of Washington, looked Trump straight in the eye and said, “Millions have put their trust in you. And as you told the nation yesterday, you have felt the providential hand of a loving God. In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now. There are gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican, and independent families, some who fear for their lives.” She went on to say, “The people who pick our crops and clean our office buildings; who labor in poultry farms and meat packing plants; who wash the dishes after we eat in restaurants and work the night shifts in hospitals, they – they may not be citizens or have the proper documentation. But the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals. They pay taxes and are good neighbors.”

After midnight last night, Trump posted  his response on Truth Social:

The so-called Bishop who spoke at the National Prayer Service on Tuesday morning was a Radical Left hard line Trump hater. She brought her church into the World of politics in a very ungracious way. She was nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart. She failed to mention the large number of illegal migrants that came into our Country and killed people. Many were deposited from jails and mental institutions. It is a giant crime wave that is taking place in the USA. Apart from her inappropriate statements, the service was a very boring and uninspiring one. She is not very good at her job! She and her church owe the public an apology! t

And, according to NPR, “After the service on Tuesday, Republican U.S. Representative Mike Collins from Georgia posted a video clip on X of Budde’s sermon along with the text, ‘The person giving this sermon should be added to the deportation list.'”

Trump was elected on a platform of fear, bigotry, and greed, and this is the platform that apparently appealed to 77,303,568 voters in November. Whether or not they admit it, the voters are to blame.

I repost that original November entry below — noting that Jonathan Swift was an Anglican clergyman as well. I’m still not sure about how I plan to spend the next four years, but I think it’s obligatory on all of us to stand against it.


Jonathan Swift was right.

On CNN the handwringing began several hours ago, and it’s likely to go on for days and days. I dread the mawkish elegies for democracy I am expecting from the Atlantic, Timothy Snyder, and Anne Applebaum. And Volodymyr Zelenskyy is getting into the act with an (understandably) craven congratulatory message on x.com.

This is not to say that the Atlantic, Snyder, and Applebaum will be wrong, or that Zelenskyy isn’t playing as careful a game as he can. But in all this handwringing, the emphasis has been on how the Democrats and the Harris campaign blew it this time. Unfortunately we now have proof that all those Hallmark-card Benetton-ad sentiments about the American voter were based on a profound misunderstanding of the ability for that voter to practice even a modicum of critical thinking, and how narrowly that voter sees their self-interest, whether it’s the price of eggs or religious and cultural belief. Never mind, really, that Trump wound up over and over again in bankruptcy court, even losing money on a gambling casino, or that he regularly sat down for dinner with anti-Semites and racists. Never mind the grotesque misogyny, the careless personal smears, the crude jokes, the daily chaos of his first term, the disparagement of scientific fact, the deep-rooted xenophobia, the shameless pandering, the felony convictions, the sexual assaults, the religious hypocrisy, the philistinism, the breathtaking greed and corruption, the threats of retribution, the incitements to violence — the constant regurgitation of every possible stupidity of which the human mind is capable.

Last night, he won, fair and square. And I know people who voted for him. God bless America.

No, it wasn’t the fault of the Democrats or Kamala Harris. It was the fault of the American voter; this is what they want. The National Constitution Center in Philadelphia will now become a quaint and very expensive museum rather than a celebration of the democratic spirit in America.

So what to do next? I had been hoping to spend the next four years of my sixth decade bereft of the constant stomach-churning irresponsibility and unpredictability, the constant insults to the human spirit, of Trump’s first term, but those who voted for Trump have decided to deny me that. I blame them for that the most (though perhaps this is only proof that I can be as selfish as they are).

Oh, well. I can still turn to the elegance of Vienna and the German language, as well as the charms of Philadelphia. My family continues to give me the greatest pleasures, outstripping even those of Vienna and Philadelphia. There is good wine to drink, good music to listen to, good writing to read. There’s also my dwindling ability to do what I can to promote kindness, peace, and decency (though I seem to be in the minority here, based on the election results).

And laughter, they say, is the best medicine. I can continue to turn to the great American satire of Mark Twain (“Against the assault of laughter nothing can stand,” he wrote — wishful thinking, but I’ll take what I can get) and H.L. Mencken, to whom perhaps I should have been listening more closely. I doubted their misanthropy and mistrust of the American citizen; clearly, I was wrong.

And there is also Jonathan Swift, with whom I shall sign off today. In the second book of Gulliver’s Travels, the adventurer finds himself at the court of the Brobdingnagian king. “He desired I would give him as exact an account of the government of England as I possibly could; because, as fond as princes commonly are of their own customs (for so he conjectured of other monarchs, by my former discourses), he should be glad to hear of anything that might deserve imitation,” Gulliver (yclept Grildig in this country) explains. Gulliver describes the government of England to the Brobdingnagian king at considerable length. And, although England is a constitutional monarchy and the United States a representative democracy, I think the king’s response remains valid. Quoth Gulliver:

[The king] was perfectly astonished with the historical account I gave him of our affairs during the last century; protesting “it was only a heap of conspiracies, rebellions, murders, massacres, revolutions, banishments, the very worst effects that avarice, faction, hypocrisy, perfidiousness, cruelty, rage, madness, hatred, envy, lust, malice, and ambition, could produce.”

His majesty, in another audience, was at the pains to recapitulate the sum of all I had spoken; compared the questions he made with the answers I had given; then taking me into his hands, and stroking me gently, delivered himself in these words, which I shall never forget, nor the manner he spoke them in: “My little friend Grildrig, you have made a most admirable panegyric upon your country; you have clearly proved, that ignorance, idleness, and vice, are the proper ingredients for qualifying a legislator; that laws are best explained, interpreted, and applied, by those whose interest and abilities lie in perverting, confounding, and eluding them. I observe among you some lines of an institution, which, in its original, might have been tolerable, but these half erased, and the rest wholly blurred and blotted by corruptions. It does not appear, from all you have said, how any one perfection is required toward the procurement of any one station among you; much less, that men are ennobled on account of their virtue; that priests are advanced for their piety or learning; soldiers, for their conduct or valour; judges, for their integrity; senators, for the love of their country; or counsellors for their wisdom. As for yourself,” continued the king, “who have spent the greatest part of your life in travelling, I am well disposed to hope you may hitherto have escaped many vices of your country. But by what I have gathered from your own relation, and the answers I have with much pains wrung and extorted from you, I cannot but conclude the bulk of your natives to be the most pernicious race of little odious vermin that nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the earth.”

Or, as P.J. O’Rourke once put it, in much the same spirit, “Authority has always attracted the lowest elements in the human race. All through history, mankind has been bullied by scum. Those who lord it over their fellows and toss commands in every direction and would boss the grass in the meadow about which way to bend in the wind are the most depraved kind of prostitutes. They will submit to any indignity, perform any vile act, do anything to achieve power. The worst off-sloughings of the planet are the ingredients of sovereignty. Every government is a parliament of whores. The trouble is, in a democracy the whores are us.”

George Hunka

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