Vacations in Salzburg: Easter festival

For many residents of old Salzburg the main sign of spring is opening of the Salzburg Easter Festival, which during 45 years starts on Saturday preceding the feast of the Palm Sunday. This year's grand opening of the Festival will be held on April 16 and for the whole week the city will be flooded with tens of thousands of opera lovers and fans of chamber music.

Organizer of the first Easter Festival in 1967 became a world-renowned Austrian conductor Herbert von Karajan. He considered Salzburg as the musical capital of Europe and he created Salzburg Easter Festival as an organic addition to the August Salzburg Summer Festival. Thanks to good organization and unique program, Easter Festival is considered to be one of the best and most respected film festivals around the world. It is largely facilitated by the fact that the program of concerts always includes Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Initially, the repertoire of the festival was presented mostly by classical works of German and Austrian composers, but since 1994 the festival program was included contemporary music and performances of youth orchestras.

This year the festival will start from opera of Stephen Gerhein (Norwegian follower of Goetz Friedrich), "Salome" by Richard Strauss, accompanied by the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. In addition, during the festival will be performed works of Glazunov, Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Mahler and many other great composers. And among most outstanding conductors will be Gustavo Dudamel and Simon Rattle, who is also art director of the Salzburg Easter Festival.

Salzburg Music Festival is not only one of the most famous, but also one of the most expensive. Tickets for it cost about 1250 euros but, despite this, they are bought at high speed. As well as hotel rooms in the city center, near the concert hall.

Apartments in Salzburg, accommodation for the festival are available for online booking on cottages-for-holidays.com.