Ring in the New Year with Salute to Vienna at the Center 1/1/2011

Experience the joy and magic of a traditional Viennese style New Year when SALUTE TO VIENNA returns to the Orange County Performing Arts Center's Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall at Segerstrom Center for the Arts on New Year's Day, Saturday, January 1 at 8 p.m. This elegant celebration features a brilliant new cast of more than 75 musicians, European dancers and singers to inspire and delight audiences with a glorious bouquet of favorite waltzes by "Waltz King" Johann Strauss Jr., polkas and famous operetta experts.

Tickets to see New Year's Concert 2011 - SALUTE TO VIENNA start at $45 and are available online at OCPAC.org, the Center's Box Office at 600 Town Center Drive in Costa Mesa or by calling 714.556.2787. For inquiries about group ticket discounts for 15 or more, call the Group Services office at 714.755.0236. The TTY number is 714.556.2746.

Entering its 17th season, the SALUTE TO VIENNA (STV) concert series has become a favorite holiday musical tradition throughout North America.

The series combines the brilliant talents of The Strauss Symphony of America and some of Europe's finest maestros, tenors, sopranos and dancers: Mika Eichenholz, Patricia Nessy, Alexandru Badea and dancers from the Vienna City Ballet - all performing and celebrating the glorious, uplifting music of Johann Strauss Jr. and his contemporaries. STV is delightfully reminiscent of Vienna's famous and beloved Neujahrskonzert, performed by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra for over 70 years and televised annually to 1.3 billion people around the globe. Over the past decade, STV has grown into the largest live concert series of its kind in North America under the leadership of Attila and Marion Glatz, co-Presidents of AGCP, the founders and producers of this unique New Year's tradition.

In 1995, AGCP premiered STV in Toronto's Roy Thomson Hall. By 2004, the show was being presented in 33 major concert halls over a five-day period across the continent, including sold-out performances in Los Angeles (Walt Disney Concert Hall), Philadelphia (Kimmel Center), Washington, D.C. (Kennedy Center), New York City (Lincoln Center), Boston (Symphony Hall), Montreal (Place des Arts), Vancouver (Orpheum Theatre) and Calgary (Jack Singer Concert Hall). This upcoming concert marks STV's fourth visit to the Center.

SALUTE TO VIENNA is the only genuine re-creation of the original Viennese production and is officially recognized by the Mayor of Vienna as an authentic Viennese New Year's celebration. The Glatzes have steadily expanded their favorite concert since its Toronto debut and were awarded the Austrian Government's prestigious Decoration of Merit in Gold. As Mr. Glatz says, "What Nutcracker means to Christmas, Salute to Vienna means to the New Year!"
For more information, please visit salutetovienna.com or call 1.800.545.7807.

Orange County Performing Arts Center
The Orange County Performing Arts Center presents a wide variety of the most significant national and international productions of music, dance and theater to the people of Southern California. It is committed to supporting artistic excellence on all of its stages and offering unsurpassed experiences, engaging the entire community in new and exciting ways through the unique power of live performance and an array of inspiring programs.

As Orange County's largest non-profit arts organization, the Center owns and operates the 3,000-seat Segerstrom Hall and intimate 250-seat Founders Hall, which opened in 1986, and the 2,000-seat Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, which opened in 2006 and also houses the 500-seat Samueli Theater, and the Lawrence and Kristina Dodge Education Center's studio performance space and Boeing Education Lab. These state-of-the-art facilities are united by a community arts plaza.

The Center's Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall and community plaza, along with facilities of the adjacent Tony® Award-winning South Coast Repertory and a site designated as the new home of the Orange County Museum of Art, are located at Segerstrom Center for the Arts.

The Orange County Performing Arts Center presents a broad range of programming each season for audiences of all ages from throughout Orange County, and beyond, including international ballet and dance, national tours of top Broadway shows, intimate performances of jazz and cabaret, contemporary artists, classical music performed by renowned chamber orchestras and ensembles, family-friendly programming, free performances open to the public from outdoor movie screenings to dancing on the plaza and many other special events.

It offers many education programs designed to inspire young people through the arts. These programs reach hundreds of thousands of students of all ages with vital arts-in-education programs, enhancing their studies and enriching their lives well into the future.

The Orange County Performing Arts Center is proud to serve as the artistic home to the region's major performing arts organizations: Pacific Symphony, the Philharmonic Society of Orange County and the Pacific Chorale.

For more information, visit OCPAC.org. The Center can also be found online at Blogger, YouTube, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and Flickr.