Live performance of famous waltz to be beamed into space
The European Space Agency and the Vienna Tourist Board hope to correct a missed opportunity to send a classical piece written by Johann Strauss II, with deep ties to space exploration, into the universe.
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VIENNA – A classical masterpiece with deep ties to spaceflight pop culture will finally reach the stars next week when the European Space Agency beams a live performance of "The Blue Danube" waltz by the Vienna Symphony Orchestra into the universe.
Many considered "By the Beautiful Blue Danube" an anthem of space after it was featured in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. However, when NASA’s Voyager 1 and 2 probes launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, in 1977, the waltz was not included among the songs on the two Voyager Golden Records.
A tourist poses for a photo in front of a statue of composer Johann Strauss by sculptor Edmund Hellmer at the Stadtpark in Vienna on February 13, 2017. - The most famous waltz by Johann Strauss. (Photo by VLADIMIR SIMICEK/AFP / Getty Images)
The Vienna Tourist Board partnered with ESA to host the interstellar "Waltz Into Space" event to mark the 200th birthday of the late composer Johann Strauss II and the 50th birthday of the European Space Agency.
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While it's unclear why the Waltz King's most famous piece wasn't included on the Golden Records, the Vienna Tourist Board made a spoof video suggesting that maybe a mission manager "forgot" to give the record back in time to make the launch because they were too busy enjoying the beautiful music. The European initiative is "using modern technology to correct a historical mistake."
"This demonstrates that our technology can transmit not only scientific data but also human art over long distances," ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher said. "This year also marks the 50th anniversary of our global ground station network. This broadcast will be a special moment that will show that music – just like space – connects all of humanity."
The golden record is a 12-inch gold-plated copper phonograph record that was attached to both the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecrafts. (NASA)
On Saturday, Wiener Symphoniker (the Vienna Symphony) will play Strauss’s waltz live as ESA uses its 35-meter-diameter deep-space dish antenna in Spain to transmit the song into the stars, beyond even NASA’s interstellar Voyager spacecraft.
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The concert from the MAK Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna will also be broadcast around the world, and there will be an in-person viewing event at Bryant Park in New York City. The live broadcast and event will happen at 2:30 p.m. ET and 8:30 p.m. local time in Vienna.
This illustration shows the positions of NASA's Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 probes outside the heliosphere, the region surrounding our star, beyond which interstellar space begins. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech) (NASA)
According to the Symphony, the signal will be sent into space at the speed of light, passing the Moon in over a second, Mars in 4 minutes and the outer limits of our solar system in 17 hours.
After 24 hours, the final chords of the Danube Waltz will reach the Voyager 1 spacecraft more than 15 billion miles from Earth. Both Voyager 1 and 2 continue operating in interstellar space more than 47 years after launching.