By the the Blue-Chip Danube

THE PROFESSION

The taxi driver knows the latest back stage gossip from the opera house. The maid hums Schubert lieder while brewing coffee. The shopkeeper can debate the baton technique of leading conductors. Throughout Austria, everybody seems to be caught up in music, whether as a cultural pursuit, political issue, spectator sport, historical tradition or simple daily pleasure. Other countries may name their streets after composers, but Austria must be the only place where a crack train is called the Mozart Express, and where the national airline has planes called Beethoven, Schubert and Bruckner. Even affairs of state become insignificant next to the true national passion; today, the directorship of the Vienna State Opera is a post scarcely less prestigious than the presidency of the Republic.

Inevitably, anything that so permeates the life of a nation is bound to affect its economy. Music is a $30 million item on Austria's national and regional budgets, and it is the cornerstone of the country's biggest industry, the annual $600 million tourist trade. The Vienna State Opera's $10 million subsidy is bigger than the budget for the entire Austrian foreign service. With ten major orchestras and seven opera houses, Austria has ample opportunities for musicians, and 4,000 of its youngsters are currently studying music with an eye to sharing in the rewards, financial as well as artistic. There are, in fact, 7,500 professional musicians in Austria --about one-tenth of 1% of the 7,000,000 population (the same percentage as in the U.S.). Says Vienna impresario Peter Weiser: "At 20, a young musician can have the solvency and social position of an advertising vice president." Top Viennese instrumentalists make the equivalent of $14,000 a year, and members of the Vienna Philharmonic can get $20,000 worth of credit at a local bank just for the asking.

Recognizing the special status and power of Austria's musicians, the French-based investment firm Investors Overseas Services has now started a mutual-fund service exclusively for them -- the first time such a program been offered to musicians anywhere in the world. While it is too early to predict the success of I.O.S.'s unusual venture there can be no doubt, as a company official said last week, that "the money is there."

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