MUSIC

Two weeks after Herbert von Karajan’s death, the Salzburg Festival bade farewell Sunday to its greatest maestro and mentor in a commemorative hour of music, with no speeches. “His language was music,” said a footnote of the program to explain the lack of official tributes. Karajan, who dominated the Salzburg musical scene for nearly four decades, died of heart failure July 16. He was 81. The ceremony at Great Festival Hall was broadcast on Austrian television and transmitted to several other countries. The Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, under the baton of Seiji Ozawa, George Solti and James Levine, played selections by Bach, Beethoven, Brahms and Mozart. The ceremony was attended by Karajan’s widow, Eliette, President Kurt Waldheim, Chancellor Franz Vranitzky and hundreds of other guests. A church ceremony was held in Salzburg Cathedral on July 23.