Before reading, be sure you have half a pack of cigarettes and a full tank of petrol. And put on sunglasses, even though it’s dark outside. Because here’s a music festival to warm Jake and Elwood’s hearts: the Vienna Blues Spring.
- Regular performances throughout this fine blues festival
- Most gigs are at the cult Der Reigen venue
- Both regional and international musicians perform
- 2023 dates: TBA (was late March to mid-June in 2022)
- See also:
The festival
You can imagine the likes of Beethoven and Mozart appreciating the blues, given the troubles they encountered in their own lives. And Vienna is not short of a few clubs and bars where the Mojo Blues Band and genre colleagues ply their trade.
The Vienna Blues Spring festival brings together local performers and overseas guests in a feast of blues riffs and whisky-honed voices. Regular performances take place at the Der Reigen venue, with occasional special gigs at other locations.
Der Reigen is a bar, restaurant and venue with a long musical past that dates back to the 1950s jazz scene.
Though I still put on my
(And you can’t help but like the idea of listening to, for example, blues unplugged in the Mozarthaus, where Vienna’s most famous musician once composed The Marriage of Figaro.)
This is not a huge festival, but an opportunity to enjoy the local blues scene in its most intense form, with a generous number of international musicians to round out the experience.
Dates and tickets
I await formal dates for 2023 (or check the website for the latest). The event ran from March 20th to May 31st in 2022, with a couple of extra performances in June.
For physical gigs, you can reserve and/or purchase tickets from the venues or from a ticket agency (depending on the individual event and location). Again, the website should have all the details.
How to get to Der Reigen
The main venue is in Vienna’s 14th district, away from the centre, but close to the tourist hotspot that is Schönbrunn Palace (a place better known for music of the classical kind).
Find Der Reigen immediately opposite the Hietzing station, which is a stop on the U4 subway line.
Catch the U4 from, for example, the Karlsplatz and Schwedenplatz stations in the centre of town. Hietzing’s also a stop on the 10 and 60 tram lines, and the 51A, 56A, 56B and 58A bus lines.
Address: Hadikgasse 62, 1140 Vienna (for Der Reigen)