New Year’s Music Traditions Worldwide

Music is the universal language of New Year's celebrations, and what you hear at midnight reveals

surprising cultural divides. In English-speaking countries, everyone locks arms

for "Auld Lang Syne", a Scottish poem turned global anthem thanks to a Canadian bandleader named

Guy Lombardo who broadcast it every New Year's Eve for decades. Meanwhile,

across Europe, midnight means waltzes. Austrians hear Johann Strauss's "The Blue Danube" as the clock

strikes twelve, and the Vienna Philharmonic's January first concert reaches half a billion viewers worldwide.

Japan takes a completely different approach. Buddhist temples ring bells exactly 108 times in a ritual

called Joya no Kane, each chime meant to cleanse one earthly desire. Latin America turns