The year before the Vienna Opera House was finished, in 1869, one of the architects heard one jape too many about his ornate creation and hanged himself. But no city ever loved its opera house more than Vienna. Under the Habsburgs, young aristocrats and the better-heeled bourgeoisie found it a home away from home, and its corps de ballet was famed for much more than dancing.
There was opera, too. Vienna had its operatic golden age (1897-1907) under Composer-Conductor Gustav Mahler, a perfectionist who, so legend has it, personally walked Brünnhilde's horse around the...
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