Kristi Hovington and her 14-year-old daughter were moping around Vienna on Thursday, devastated over Taylor Swift ’s canceled concert when they found some comfort in a church.
The pair heard Swift’s “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince” coming through the sanctuary’s wooden doors, the inside filled with fans singing, holding hands and shedding tears.
“It was emotional,” said Hovington, a 46-year-old school librarian from Barcelona, who also cried in the church. “It was just a really unexpected, beautiful moment.”
Swifties, as the popstar’s fans are called, are doing their best to shake off the sudden cancellation of three Swift concerts in the Austrian capital. More than 200,000 fans were expected to attend the shows in Vienna before officials foiled an alleged terror plot targeting the shows.
Swift’s publicist didn’t respond to a request for comment, and the singer hasn’t commented on social media.
While jilted ticket holders will get a refund on the show, some spent thousands on hotels and plane tickets to be there, not to mention months of preparation on what to wear . Businesses in Vienna tried to ease the pain, giving away free burgers and Swarovski crystals to ticket holders.
Promoters canceled the show on Wednesday, the day before the first concert.
Fans of the singer Taylor Swift leave bracelets on a tree and collect others as they gather following the cancellation of three Taylor Swift concerts at Happel stadium after the government confirmed a planned attack at the venue, in Vienna, Austria August 8, 2024. REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl
Fans of the singer Taylor Swift leave bracelets on a tree and collect others as they gather following the cancellation of three Taylor Swift concerts at Happel stadium after the government confirmed a planned attack at the venue, in Vienna, Austria August 8, 2024. REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl
Fans of the singer Taylor Swift trade bracelets as they gather following the cancellation of three Taylor Swift concerts at Happel stadium after the government confirmed a planned attack at the venue, in Vienna, Austria August 8, 2024. REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl
“I just started screaming,” said Andrea Douglass, when she heard of the cancellation. “We pretty much didn’t sleep last night.”
Douglass said she spent over $2,000 on flights from Providence, R.I., and on an Airbnb with friends as a 50th birthday gift to herself. She said the cancellation was the right decision.
“I keep on trying to tell myself, ‘I’d rather be sad than dead,’” she said.
Two teenage suspects were arrested over the alleged plot, in which authorities say they planned to drive a bomb-filled car into crowds outside the venue in an attempt to kill as many people as possible.
The main suspect, a 19-year-old Austrian citizen, pledged allegiance to Islamic State in July, authorities said. He had planned, along with a 17-year-old accomplice, to use explosives and knives to kill attendees during Swift’s three-night run at the Ernst-Happel-Stadion. A third person, an 18-year-old Iraqi national, was detained late Thursday as part of the ongoing investigation, according to Austria’s interior ministry.
The cancellation is a rare setback in Swift’s record-breaking Eras Tour, which started in the U.S. in March 2023. The tour has been a phenomenon, with fans filling hotels and crowding restaurants, with cities reporting an economic boost .
The Eras Tour, a greatest-hits-like show in which Swift performs songs from each of her albums, is the first tour to have grossed more than $1 billion in ticket sales, according to concert trade publication Pollstar.
Fans of US mega-star Taylor Swift crowd merchandising booths on August 7, 2024 in front of the Ernst Happel Stadium in Vienna, Austria, prior to her three scheduled concerts. (Photo by Eva MANHART / APA / AFP) / Austria OUT
The cancellation might still benefit Vienna as some Swifties seek to heal with retail therapy.
“I think I might splurge on a purse,” Douglass said about a leather Longchamp bag she’s eyeing. “It’ll be my Taylor Swift memory purse.”
Douglass, a finance manager for a pharmacy chain, said she also plans to spend more time seeing Vienna’s attractions.
Even though Swift isn’t performing, Vienna has turned into Taylor town.
Htoomyat Zeyar, who spent about $5,000 on a European trip planned around the Vienna concert, said fans are gathering in the streets and swapping friendship bracelets. Every store he enters blasts Taylor Swift music.
“It makes me feel happy and sad at the same time,” said the 22-year-old software engineer from Richmond, Va.
“It feels like a community,” 41-year-old Bianca Capazorio said in an interview from Stephansplatz, a Vienna square where she estimated more than 1,000 fans had gathered.
At 6 p.m. Thursday, the same time the concert was supposed to start, she said the crowd started singing each song in the Eras Tour in the order Swift performs them.
Capazorio, who works in public relations and spent $800 on her plane ticket from Cape Town, South Africa, says she took advantage of freebies around town, including a free lunch from hamburger chain Le Burger and a free necklace from a store of crystal jewelry brand Swarovski.
He’s no Taylor Swift, but fans can check out Mozart’s former home free of charge. Vienna’s mayor, Michael Ludwig, offered ticket holders free access to several of Vienna’s museums, including the composer’s home, where tickets typically cost 14 euros. Ludwig said in a tweet that it was “a small gesture of comfort.”
Julia Schnizlein, pastor of the church where Swifties gathered, said she too had tickets to the show for her 14-year-old daughter. Schnizlein, who is 45 and has been pastor of the Lutheran City Church for five years, opened the church’s doors Thursday, plugged her phone in the speaker system and put out a sign on the street telling Swifties to come in and sing their sadness away.
“I thought it would be nice if there was a place where fans could come together in peace, express their feelings and even cry,” said Schnizlein. “It was also important to me that the terrorists don’t have the last word.”
Write to Joseph Pisani at joseph.pisani@wsj.com
