Composer, born in Munich, SE Germany. He studied at Munich and Berlin, and conducted at Meiningen, Munich, Weimar, Bayreuth, and Berlin. He is best known for his symphonic poems, such as Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche (18945, Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks) and Also sprach Zarathustra (18956, Thus Spoke Zarathustra), and his operas, notably Der Rosenkavalier (1911) and Ariadne auf Naxos (1912, Ariadne on Naxos). He also wrote concertos, songs, and several small-scale orchestral works.
Richard Strauss (June 11, 1864 – September 8, 1949) was a German composer of the late Romantic era, particularly noted for his tone poems and operas.
History
Early life
He was born on June 11, 1864, in Munich (then in the Kingdom of Bavaria, now in Germany), the son of Franz Strauss, who was the principal horn player at the Court Opera in Munich. In 1874 Strauss heard his first Wagner operas, Lohengrin, Tannhäuser and Siegfried; the influence of Wagner's music on Strauss's style was to be profound, but at first his father forbade him to study it: it was not until the age of 16 that he was able to obtain a score of Tristan und Isolde. Indeed, in the Strauss household the music of Richard Wagner was considered inferior. Later in life, Richard Strauss said and wrote that he deeply regretted this. Strauss's style began to change when he met Alexander Ritter, a noted composer and violinist, and the husband of one of Richard Wagner's nieces. It was Ritter who persuaded Strauss to abandon the conservative style of his youth, and begin writing tone poems; he also introduced Strauss to the essays of Richard Wagner and the writings of Schopenhauer. Strauss went on to conduct one of Ritter's operas, and later Ritter wrote a poem based on Strauss's own Tod und Verklärung.
Richard Strauss married soprano singer Pauline Maria de Ahna on September 10, 1894. Strauss knew he had found his own musical voice, saying "I now comfort myself with the knowledge that I am on the road I want to take, fully conscious that there never has been an artist not considered crazy by thousands of his fellow men." Strauss went on to write a series of other tone poems, including Aus Italien (1886), Tod und Verklärung (Death and Transfiguration, 1888 – 89), Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche (Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, 1894 – 95), Also sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spoke Zarathustra, 1896, the opening section of which is well known today for its use in Stanley Kubrick's film 2001: A Space Odyssey), Don Quixote (1897), Ein Heldenleben (A Hero's Life, 1897 – 98), Sinfonia Domestica (Domestic Symphony 1902 – 03) and Eine Alpensinfonie (An Alpine Symphony 1911 – 15).
Opera
Around the end of the 19th century, Strauss turned his attention to opera. However, some of the negative reactions may have stemmed from Strauss's use of dissonance, rarely heard then at the opera house. Elsewhere the opera was highly successful and Strauss financed his house in Garmisch-Partenkirchen completely from the revenues generated by the opera. It was also the first opera in which Strauss collaborated with the poet Hugo von Hofmannsthal. For these later works, however, Strauss moderated his harmonic language somewhat, with the result that works such as Der Rosenkavalier (The Knight of the Rose, 1910) were great public successes. Strauss continued to produce operas at regular intervals until 1940.
Solo and chamber works
Strauss's solo and chamber works include early compositions for piano solo in a conservative harmonic style, many of which are lost;
Solo instrument with orchestra
Much more extensive was his output of works for solo instrument or instruments with orchestra. Strauss admitted that the duet concertino had an extra-musical "plot", in which the clarinet represented a princess and the bassoon a bear;
Strauss and the Nazis
There is much controversy surrounding Strauss' role in Germany after the Nazi Party came to power. Several noted musicians disapproved of his conduct while the Nazis were in power, among them the conductor Arturo Toscanini, who famously said, "To Strauss the composer I take off my hat; to Strauss the man I put it back on again."
In November 1933, without any consultation with Strauss, Goebbels appointed him to the post of president of the Reichsmusikkammer, the State Music Bureau. Strauss decided to keep his post but to remain apolitical, a decision which has been criticized as naïve, but perhaps the most sensible one considering the circumstances. In 1935, Strauss was forced to resign his position as Reichsmusikkammer president, after refusing to remove from the playbill for Die schweigsame Frau the name of the Jewish librettist, his friend Stefan Zweig.
His decision to produce Friedenstag in 1938, a one-act opera set in a besieged fortress during the Thirty Years' War – essentially a hymn to peace and a thinly veiled criticism of the Third Reich – during a time when an entire nation was preparing for war, has been seen as extraordinarily brave. With its contrasts between freedom and enslavement, war and peace, light and dark, this work has been considered more related to Fidelio than to any of Strauss's other recent operas.
When his daughter-in-law Alice was placed under house arrest in Garmisch in 1938, Strauss used his connections in Berlin, for example the Berlin Intendant Heinz Tietjen, to secure her safety; Unfortunately Strauss left no specific records or commentary regarding his feeling about Nazi Anti-Semitism, so most of the reconstruction of his motivations during the period are conjectural. While most of his actions during the 1930s were midway between outright collaboration and dissidence, it was only in his music that the dissident streak was, in retrospect, more obvious, such as in the pacifist drama Friedenstag.
In 1942 Strauss moved with his family back to Vienna, where Alice and her children could be protected by Baldur von Schirach, the Gauleiter of Vienna. Unfortunately even he was unable to protect Strauss's Jewish relatives completely; in early 1944, while Strauss was away, Alice and the composer's son were abducted by the Gestapo and imprisoned for two nights. Only Strauss's personal intervention at this point was able to save them, and he was able to take the two of them back to Garmisch, where they remained, under house arrest, until the end of the war.
Strauss completed the composition of Metamorphosen, a work for 23 solo strings, in 1945. The piece mourned the destruction of Germany wrought by World War II, but also encouraged the continued examination of Strauss's sympathy for Nazi Germany. It is now generally accepted that Metamorphosen was composed, specifically, to mourn the bombing of Strauss's favorite opera house;
The final years
In 1948, Strauss wrote his last work, Vier letzte Lieder ("Four last songs") for soprano and orchestra, reportedly with Kirsten Flagstad in mind. Strauss himself declared in 1947, "I may not be a first-rate composer, but I am a first-class second-rate composer!"
Richard Strauss died on September 8, 1949, in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany at the age of 85.
Principal works
Tone poems
Aus Italien (1886) Macbeth (1888/90) Don Juan (1889) Tod und Verklärung (Death and Transfiguration) (1891) Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche (Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks) (1895) Also sprach Zarathustra (1896) Don Quixote (1898) Ein Heldenleben (1899) Symphonia Domestica (Domestic Symphony) (1904) Eine Alpensinfonie (An Alpine Symphony) (1915)Other orchestral works
Symphony in D minor (1880) Concerto in D minor for violin and orchestra, op. 2 for horn and orchestra in E flat major (1942) Concerto for Oboe (1945) Double Concertino for clarinet and oboe and orchestra (1947) Film music for Der Rosenkavalier (1925)Operas
Guntram (1894) Feuersnot (1901) Salome (1905) Elektra (1909) Der Rosenkavalier (The Knight of the Rose) (1910) Ariadne auf Naxos (1912) Die Frau ohne Schatten (1918) Intermezzo (1923) Die ägyptische Helena (The Egyptian Helena) (1927) Arabella (1932) Die schweigsame Frau (The Silent Woman) (1934) Friedenstag (Day of Peace) (1936) Daphne (1937) Die Liebe der Danae (1940) Capriccio (1941)Ballet music
Josephslegende (The Legend of Joseph) (1914) Crême chantilly (Schlagobers) (1924)Choir works
Zwei Gesänge, op. 27 (1894) "Four of his greatest Lieder," according to Strauss scholar Michael Kennedy. Huber Kennedy, "Richard Strauss and John Henry Mackay" in Thamyris 2 Metamorphosen for 23 solo strings (1945) Vier letzte Lieder (Four Last Songs) (1948)Sources
Michael Kennedy, "Richard Strauss," The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. ISBN 1-56159-174-2 Bryan Gilliam: "Richard Strauss", Grove Music Online ed. in particular, the analysis of Strauss's behavior during the Nazi period is more detailed.) David Dubal, "The Essential Canon of Classical Music," North Point Press, 2003. Richard Strauss: Man, Musician, Enigma. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Richard Strauss: An Intimate Portrait. London: Thames & Richard Strauss's Orchestral Music and the German Intellectual Tradition: the Philosophical Roots of Musical Modernism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.See also:
Category:Compositions by Richard Strauss
User Comments Add a comment…