Smetana’s most famous work for orchestra comes from his cycle of six national tone poems entitledMy Country(Má Vlast), which he wrote between 1874 and 1879 in a tonal tribute to his native land. Each of the tone poems is a picture of a different facet of Bohemian life, geography, and background. The most famous composition of this set isThe Moldau(Vltava), a portrait of the famous Bohemian river. This is a literal tonal representation of the following descriptive program interpolated by the composer in his published score:
“Two springs gush forth in the shade of the Bohemian forest, the one warm and spouting, the other cold and tranquil. Their waves, gayly rushing onward over their rocky beds, unite and glisten in the rays of the morning sun. The forest brook, fast hurrying on, becomes the river Vltava, which, flowing ever on through Bohemia’s valleys, grows to be a mighty stream; it flows through thick woods in which the joyous noise of the hunt and the notes of the hunter’s horn are heard ever nearer and nearer; it flows through grass-grown pastures and lowlands where a wedding feast is celebrated with song and dancing. At night the wood and water nymphs revel in its shining waves, in which many fortresses and castles are reflected as witnesses of the past glory of knighthood and the vanished warlike fame of bygone ages. At St. John Rapids the stream rushes on, winding in and out through the cataracts, and hews out a path for itself with its foaming waves through the rocky chasm into the broad river bed in which it flows on in majestic repose toward Prague, welcomed by time-honored Vysehrad, whereupon it vanishes in the far distance from the poet’s gaze.”
The rippling flow of the river Moldau is portrayed by fast figures in the strings, the background for a broad and sensual folk song representing the river itself heard in violins and woodwind. Hunting calls are sounded by the horns, after which a lusty peasant dance erupts from the full orchestra. Nymphs and naiads disport to the strains of a brief figure in the woodwind. A transition by the wind brings back the beautiful Moldau song. A climax is built up, after which the setting becomes once again serene. The Moldau continues its serene course towards Prague.
John Philip Sousa, America’s foremost composer of march music, was born in Washington, D. C., on November 6, 1854. The son of a trombone player in the United States Marine Band, John Philip early received music instruction, mainly the violin from John Esputa. When he was about thirteen, John enlisted in the Marine Corps where he played in its band for two years. For several years after that he played the violin in and conducted the orchestras of various theaters; in the summer of 1877 he played in an orchestra conducted by Jacques Offenbach at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition. Between 1880 and 1892 he was the musical director of the Marine Band. It was during this period that he wrote his first famous marches. In 1892 he formed a band of his own with which he toured Europe and America for many years, and with which he gave more than a thousand concerts. His most popular marches (together with his best transcriptions for band of national ballads and patriotic airs) were always the highlights of his concerts. Besides the marches, Sousa wrote the music for numerous comic operas, the most famous beingEl Capitan(1896) andThe Bride Elect(1898). In 1918 Sousa and his band were heard in the Hippodrome extravaganza,Everything. He published his autobiography,Marching Along, in 1928, and died in Reading, Pennsylvania, on March 6, 1932.
In the closing years of the 19th century, and in the first part of the 20th, America was undergoing expansion in many directions: art, science, literature, commerce, finance, world affairs. Hand in hand with this development and growth came an aroused patriotism and an expanding chauvinism. Sousa’s marches were the voice of this new and intense national consciousness.
As Sigmund Spaeth has pointed out, most of Sousa’s famous marches follow a similar pattern, beginning with “an arresting introduction, then using a light, skipping rhythm for his first melody, going from that into a broader tune,” then progressing to the principal march melody. A massive climax is finally realized with new, vibrant colorsbeing realized in the main march melody through striking new combinations of instruments.
The following are some of Sousa’s most popular marches:
El Capitan(1896) was adapted from a choral passage from the comic opera of the same name. This music was played aboard Admiral Dewey’s flagship,Olympia, when it steamed down Manila Bay for battle during the Spanish-American War. And it was again heard, this time performed by Sousa’s own band, when Dewey was welcomed as a conquering hero in New York on September 30, 1900.
King Cotton(1895) was written on the occasion of the engagement of the Sousa Band at the Cotton States Exposition.Semper Fideles(1888) was Sousa’s first famous composition in march tempo, and to this day it is still one of his best known marches, a perennial favorite with parades of all kinds. Since Sousa sold this march outright for $35.00 he never capitalized on its immense popularity.
Sousa’s masterpiece—and probably one of the most famous marches ever written—was theStars and Stripes Forever, completed on April 26, 1897. In 1897 Sousa was a tourist in Italy when he heard the news that his friend and manager had died in the United States. Sousa decided to return home. Aboard theTeutonica march melody kept haunting him. As soon as he came home he put the melody down on paper, and it became the principal subject of “The Stars and Stripes Forever.” This principal melody achieves an unforgettable climax in the march when it is proudly thundered by the full orchestra to figurations in the piccolo.
The ThundererandThe Washington Post Marchwere written in 1889. The latter was commissioned by theWashington Postfor the ceremonies attending the presentation of prizes in a student essay contest.
Among Sousa’s other marches areThe Bride Elect(1897) from the comic opera of the same name;The Fairest of the Fair(1908);Hands Across the Sea(1899);Invincible Eagle(1901); andSaber and Spurs(1915) dedicated to the United States Cavalry.
It was long maintained that Sousa was the composer of the famous hymn of the Artillery branch of the United States armed services, “The Caisson Song.” Sousa played this march in his own brilliant new band arrangement at a Liberty Loan Drive at the Hippodrome, in New York, in 1918. For some time thereafter Sousa was credited as being the composer. But further research revealed the fact that the words and music had been written in 1908 by Edmund L. Gruber, then a lieutenant with the 5th Artillery in the Philippines.
Oley Speaks was born in Canal Winchester, Ohio, on June 28, 1874. He received his musical training, principally in voice, from various teachers including Armour Galloway and Emma Thursby. He then filled the post of baritone soloist at churches in Cleveland, Ohio, and New York City, including the St. Thomas Church in New York from 1901 to 1906. He also filled numerous engagements in song recitals and performances of oratorios. He died in New York City on August 27, 1948.
Speaks was the composer of more than 250 published art songs which have placed him in a front rank among American song composers. Three have become outstandingly popular; there is hardly a male singer anywhere who has not sung such all-time favorites as “Morning,” “On the Road to Mandalay” and “Sylvia,” each of which is among the most widely circulated and most frequently heard art songs by an American. “Morning,” words by Frank L. Stanton, was published in 1910. Where “Morning” is lyrical, “On the Road to Mandalay” (published in 1907) is dramatic, a setting of the famous poem by Rudyard Kipling. The persistent rhythmic background suggesting drum beats, and the effective key change from verse to chorus, have an inescapable effect on listeners. “Sylvia,” poem by Clinton Scollard, published in 1914, is in a sentimental mood, and like “Morning” reveals the composer’s marked gift for sensitive lyricism.
Robert Stolz was born in Graz, Austria, on August 25, 1882. His parents were musical, his father being a successful conductor and teacher, and his mother a concert pianist. Robert’s music study took place first with his father, then with Robert Fuchs in Vienna and Humperdinck in Berlin. In 1901 he assumed his first post as conductor, at an opera house in Brunn. When he was twenty-five he was appointed conductor of the Theater-an-der-Wien in Vienna where he remained twelve years, directing most of the masterworks in the field of Austrian and German operettas. His own career as composer of operettas had begun in 1903 withSchoen Lorchenproduced in Salzburg. Since then Stolz has written music for about sixty operettas, scores for more than eighty films, and a thousand songs in all. His music is in the light, graceful, ebullient style that has characterized Viennese operetta music since the time of Johann Strauss II. His most famous operettas are:Die lustigen Weiber von Wien(1909),Die Gluecksmaedel(1910),Die Tanzgraefin(1921),Peppina(1931),Zwei Herzen in dreiviertel Takt(1933),Fruehling im Prater(1949) andKarneval in Wien(1950). In 1938 Stolz came to the United States where for several years he worked in Hollywood. After the end of World War II he returned to Vienna, remaining active as a composer not only in that city but also in Berlin and London.
Stolz’ most famous song is “Im Prater bluehn wieder die Baeume” (“In the Prater the Trees Are Again Blooming”), a glowing hymn not only to a district in Vienna famous for its frolic and amusement but even more so to the city of Vienna itself.
A waltz from his operetta,Two Hearts in Three-Quarter Time(Zwei Herzen in dreiviertel Takt) is perhaps one of the most celebrated pieces in three-quarter time written in Vienna since Lehár, and it is loved the world over. This operetta originated in 1931 as a German motion-picture which won accolades around the world for its charm and freshness, for which Stolz wrote a score that included his famous waltz. It was then adapted for the stage by Paul Knepler and J. M. Willeminsky and introduced in Zurich, Switzerland, in 1933. This delightful text concerns the trials and tribulations of producing an operetta.That operetta is accepted for production on the condition that a good waltz melody is written for it, and the composer Toni Hofer gets his inspiration for that tune from lovely Hedi, the young sister of the librettist. This waltz, of course, is the title number, which, in its lilt and buoyancy and Viennese love of life, is in the best tradition of Viennese popular music.
Oscar Straus was no relation to any of the famous Viennese Strausses; nevertheless in the writing of light, gay music in waltz tempo and spirited melodies for the operetta stage he was certainly their spiritual brother. He was born in Vienna on March 6, 1870, and studied music with private teachers in Vienna and Berlin, including Max Bruch. In 1901 he settled in Berlin where he became conductor at a famous cabaret,Ueberbrettl, for whose productions of farces he wrote a number of scores. Soon after that he turned to writing operettas, becoming world famous withThe Waltz Dreamin 1907 andThe Chocolate Soldierin 1908, both introduced in Vienna. He wrote about thirty operettas after that, many heard with outstanding success in the music centers of the world. The best of these wereDer letzte Walzer(1920),Die Teresina(1921),Drei Walzer(1935), andBozena(1952). He was at his best writing waltz melodies but he was also skilful in interpolating satirical elements into his musical writing through the exploitation of ragtime, jazz, and the shimmy. Straus lived in Berlin until 1927, and for a decade after that he made his home in Vienna and Paris. In 1939 he became a French citizen, and from 1940 to 1948 he lived in the United States, filling some assignments in Hollywood. He returned to his native land in 1948, and died at Bad Ischl, Austria, on January 11, 1954.
The Chocolate Soldier(Der tapfere Soldat) was the operetta adaptation of Bernard Shaw’s comedy,Arms and the Man, by R. Bernauer and L. Jacobsen. Its première took place in Vienna on November 14, 1908,with the first American performance taking place a year later at the Casino Theater in New York. The setting is Serbia in 1885 where the hero, Lieutenant Bumerli, gains the nickname of “chocolate soldier” because of a sweet tooth. While escaping from the enemy, he finds refuge in the bedroom of Nadina, daughter of Colonel Popoff. Nadina becomes the instrument by means of which the lieutenant is now able to effect his escape, disguised in the coat of Colonel Popolf. But before the final curtain Bumerli and Nadina also become lovers.
The waltz, “My Hero,” (“Komm, Komm, Held meiner Traeume”) Nadina’s waltz of love to the chocolate soldier, is the most celebrated excerpt from this operetta. Other familiar pages include the lovely first act duet of Nadina and Bumerli, “Sympathy”; the little orchestral march in the second act, a satirical take off on military pomp and circumstance; and Nadina’s “Letter Song” in the third act.
A Waltz Dream(Ein Walzertraum), book by Felix Doermann and Leopold Jacobsen, was introduced in Vienna on March 2, 1907, and in New York in April 1908. Lieutenant Niki of the Austrian army is ordered by the Austrian Emperor to marry Princess Helen, but he falls in love with Frantzi, a violinist in a girl’s orchestra. This love affair becomes frustrated when Niki must return to Vienna to become Prince Consort.
The main musical selection from this operetta is the title number, a waltz which first appears as a duet between Niki and a fellow officer in the first act, then recurs throughout the operetta, and finally brings it to a close. Two sprightly march excerpts, from the second and third acts respectively, and the duet, “Piccolo, piccolo, tsin, tsin, tsin” are also popular.
Eduard Strauss, the younger brother of Johann Strauss II, was born in Vienna on March 15, 1835. He studied music in Vienna with G. Preyer following which he made his café-house debut in 1862by conducting his father’s orchestra at the Dianasaal. He continued to lead his father’s orchestra at the Volksgarten and Musikverein as well as at various leading café-houses in Vienna. He also made many tours, including two of the United States in 1892 and 1901. In 1902 he dissolved the musical organization which his father had founded three-quarters of a century earlier and which all that time had dominated the musical life of Vienna. Besides conducting this orchestra, he also substituted from time to time for his famous brother, Johann Strauss II, and in 1870 he succeeded him as conductor of the court balls. Eduard Strauss died in Vienna on December 28, 1916.
Eduard wrote over three hundred popular instrumental compositions in the style of his celebrated brother but without ever equalling his remarkable creative freshness and originality. But there is a good deal of pleasurable listening in Eduard’s waltzes and polkas. In the former category belongs theDoctrinen(Faith) Waltzes, op. 79; in the latter, the gayBahn Frei(Fast Track) Polka, op. 45. In collaboration with his two brothers, Johann and Josef, Eduard wrote theTrifolienwalzerand theSchuetzenquadrille.
Johann Strauss I was one of the two waltz kings of Vienna bearing that name. The more famous one, the composer of “The Blue Danube” was the son. But the father was also one of Vienna’s most popular composers and café-house conductors. He was born in Vienna on March 14, 1804, and as a boy he studied both the violin and harmony. His love for music, combined with the decision of his parents to make him a bookbinder, led him to run away from home. When he was fifteen he joined Michael Pamer’s orchestra which played at the Sperl café; another of its members was Josef Lanner, soon also to become a major figure in Vienna’s musical life. As Lanner’s star rose,so did Johann Strauss’. First Strauss played in the Lanner Quartet at theGoldenen Rebbuhnand other cafés; after that he was a member of the Lanner Orchestra which appeared in Vienna’s leading cafés. When Lanner’s mounting success made it necessary for him to create two orchestras, he selected Johann Strauss to conduct one of them. Then, in 1826, Johann Strauss formed an orchestra of his own which made its debut at the Bock Café. For the next two decades he was the idol of Vienna, Lanner’s only rival. By 1830 he had two hundred musicians under him. His major successes as a café-house conductor came at the Sperl and the Redoutensaal. But his fame spread far beyond Vienna. In 1833 he toured all Austria, and in 1834 he appeared in Berlin. After that he performed in all the major European capitals, achieving formidable successes in London and Paris. Meanwhile, in 1833, he had become bandmaster of the first Vienna militia regiment, one of the highest honors a performer of light music could achieve in Austria. In 1845 he was appointed conductor of the Viennese court balls. He died in Vienna on September 25, 1849.
Like Lanner, Strauss wrote a considerable amount of dance and café-house music, over 250 compositions. His first composition was theTaeuberlwalzer, named after the caféZwei Taubenwhere he was then appearing. After that he wrote waltzes, galops, polkas, quadrilles, cotillons, contredanses, and marches—which Vienna came to love for their rhythmic vitality and appealing lyricism. People in Vienna used to say that the waltzes of the first Johann Strauss weremadefor dancing because their rhythmic pulse excited the heart and made feet restless.
Not much of the father Strauss’ library of music has survived. The exceptions are the following waltzes:Caecilien,Donaulieder, theKettenbruecken, and theLorelei Rheinsklaenge. To the waltz, the older Johann Strauss brought a symphonic dimension it had heretofore not known, particularly in his spacious introductions of which the thirty-bar prelude of theLorelei Rheinsklaengeis an outstanding example. He also carried over to the waltz a variety of mood and feeling and a lightness of touch new for this peasant dance. “This demon of the ancient Viennese folk spirit,” wrote Richard Wagner after hearing Strauss perform one of his own waltzes in Vienna, “trembled at the beginning of a new waltz like a python preparing to spring, and it was more the ecstasy produced by the music than the drinks among the enchanted audience that stimulated that magical first violin to almost dangerous flights.”
Of his other music the most famous is theRadetzky March. CountRadetzky was an Austrian military hero, victor over the Italians in 1848-1849. In honor of his Italian triumphs and suppression of the Italian nationalist movement, Strauss wrote the spirited, sharply accented march in 1848 which almost at once became the musical symbol of Hapsburg Vienna and Austrian military power. The following programmatic interpretation of this music by H. E. Jacob is of interest: “Drunk with triumph, the Generalissimo’s battalions hurl themselves down into Lombardy. They are close on the heels of the fleeing troops of King Albert, the King of Sardinia. And then comes a new phase of the march to accompany the victorious troops. A different sun shines down on this, a memory of Vienna, a lingering trace of the feel of girls’ arms; scraps of a dance song with a backward glance at three-quarter time. But on they go, still forward. There are no more shots, there is laughter. The trio follows. The ... superdominant ... hoisted as if it were a flag.... Finally comes the return of the principal theme with the laurels and gaiety of victory.”
Johann Strauss II, son of the first Johann Strauss, was born in Vienna on October 25, 1825. Though he showed an unmistakable bent for music from his childhood on, he was forbidden by his father to study music or to indulge in any musical activity whatsoever. The young Johann Strauss, encouraged by his mother, was forced to study the violin surreptitiously with a member of his father’s orchestra. Only after the father had deserted his family, to set up another home with his mistress, did young Johann begin to devote himself completely and openly to music. After studying the violin with Kohlmann and counterpoint with Joseph Drechsler, he made his debut as a café-house conductor and composer at Dommayer’s Casino in Hietzing, near Vienna, on October 15, 1844. The event was widely publicized anddramatized in Vienna, since the son was appearing as a rival to his father. For this momentous debut, the son wrote the first of his waltzes—theGunstwerberand theSinngedichte—which aroused immense enthusiasm. He had to repeat the last-named waltz so many times that the people in the café lost count. “Ah, these Viennese,” reported the editor ofThe Wanderer. “A new waltz player, a piece of world history. Good night, Lanner. Good evening, Father Strauss. Good morning, Son Strauss.” The father had not attended this performance, but learned of his son’s triumph from one of his cronies.
Thus a new waltz king had arisen in Vienna. His reign continued until the end of the century. For fifty years Johann Strauss II stood alone and unequalled as the musical idol of Vienna. His performances were the talk of the town. His own music was on everyone’s lips. After the death of father Strauss in 1849, he combined members of the older man’s orchestra with his own, and toured all of Europe with the augmented ensemble. From 1863 to 1870 he was conductor of the Viennese balls, a post once held by his father. In 1872 he made sensational appearances in Boston and New York. All the while he was writing some of the most famous waltzes ever written, as well as quadrilles and polkas and other dance pieces. And in 1871, with the première in Vienna ofIndigohe entered upon a new field, that of the operetta, in which once again he was to become a dominating figure. He was admired not merely by the masses but also by some of the greatest musicians of his generation—Brahms, Wagner, Verdi, Hans von Buelow, Offenbach, Goldmark, Gounod, all of whom expressed their admiration for his music in no uncertain terms. In 1894, Vienna celebrated the 50th anniversary of his debut with a week of festive performances; congratulations poured into Vienna from all parts of the civilized world. He died five years after that—in Vienna on June 3, 1899—and was buried near Schubert, Beethoven, and Brahms.
It is perhaps singularly fitting that Johann Strauss should have died in 1899. A century was coming to an end, and with it an entire epoch. This is what one court official meant when he said that “Emperor Francis Joseph reigned until the death of Johann Strauss.” History, with its cold precision, may accurately record that the reign of Francis Joseph actually terminated in 1916. But its heyday had passed with the 19th century. The spirit of old Vienna, imperial Vienna of the Hapsburgs, the Vienna that had been inspiration for song and story, died with Johann Strauss. After 1900, Vienna was only a shadow of its former self, and was made prostrate by World War I.
If the epoch of “old Vienna” died with Johann Strauss, it was also born with him. After 1825, the social and intellectual climate in the imperial city changed perceptibly. The people, always gay, now gave themselves up to frivolity. For this, political conditions had been responsible. The autocratic rule of Francis I brought on tyranny, repression, and an army of spies and informers. As a result, the Viennese went in for diversions that were safe from a political point of view: flirtation, gossip, dancing. They were partial to light musical plays and novels. Thus, an attitude born out of expediency, became, with the passing of time, an inextricable part of everyday life in Vienna.
Of the many light-hearted pleasures in which the Viennese indulged none was dearer to them than dancing. It has been recorded that one out of every four in Vienna danced regularly. They danced the polka, and the quadrille; but most of all they danced the waltz.
Johann Strauss II was the genius of the Viennese waltz. More than anybody before him or since he lifted the popular dance to such artistic importance that his greatest waltzes are often performed at symphony concerts by the world’s greatest orchestras under the foremost conductors. Inexhaustible was his invention; richly inventive, his harmonic writing; subtle and varied his gift at orchestration; fresh and personal his lyricism; aristocratic his structure. To the noted 20th century German critic, Paul Bekker, the Strauss waltz contained “more melodies than a symphony of Beethoven, and the aggregate of Straussian melodies is surely greater than the aggregate of Beethoven’s.”
Actually the waltz form used by Strauss is basically that of Lanner and of Strauss’ own father. A slow symphonic introduction opens the waltz. This is followed by a series of waltz melodies (usually five in number). A symphonic coda serves both as a kind of summation and as a conclusion. But here the similarity with the past ends. This form received from the younger Strauss new dimension, new amplification. His introductions are sometimes like tone poems. The waltz melodies are incomparably rich in thought and feeling, varied in mood and style. A new concept of thematic developments enters waltz writing with Strauss. And his codas, as his introductions, are symphonic creations built with consummate skill from previously stated ideas, or fragments of these ideas. No wonder, then, that the waltzes of Johann Strauss have been described as “symphonies for dancing.”
The following are the most popular of the Johann Strauss waltzes:
Acceleration(Accelerationen), op. 234, as the title indicates, derives its effect from the gradual acceleration in tempo in the main waltzmelody. Strauss had promised to write a waltz for a ball at the Sofiensaal but failed to deliver his manuscript even at the zero hour. Reminded of his promise, he sat down at a restaurant table on the night of the ball and hurriedly wrote off the completeAcceleration Waltzon the back of a menu card, and soon thereafter conducted the première performance.
Artist’s Life(Kuenstlerleben), op. 316, opens in a tender mood. A transition is provided by an alternation of soft and loud passages, after which the first waltz melody erupts zestfully as a tonal expression of the lighthearted gaiety of an artist’s life. A similar mood is projected by the other waltz melodies.
The Blue Danube(An der schoenen blauen Donau), op. 314, is perhaps the most famous waltz ever written, and one of the greatest. It is now a familiar tale how Brahms, while autographing a fan of Strauss’ wife, scribbled a few bars of this waltz and wrote underneath, “alas, not by Brahms.” Strauss wroteThe Blue Danubeat the request of John Herbeck, conductor of the Vienna Men’s Singing Society; thus the original version of the waltz is for chorus and orchestra, the text being a poem by Karl Beck in praise of Vienna and the Danube. Strauss wrote this waltz in 1867, and it was introduced on February 15 of the same year at the Dianasaal by Strauss’ orchestra, supplemented by Herbeck’s singing society. The audience was so enthusiastic that it stood on the seats and thundered for numerous repetitions. In the Spring of 1867, Strauss introduced his waltz to Paris at the International Exposition where it was a sensation. A tremendous ovation also greeted it when Strauss performed it for the first time in London, at Covent Garden in 1869. When Johann Strauss made his American debut, in Boston in 1872, he conductedThe Blue Danubewith an orchestra numbering a thousand instruments and a chorus of a thousand voices! Copies of the music were soon in demand in far-off cities of Asia and Australia. The publisher, Spina, was so deluged by orders he had to have a hundred new copper plates made from which to print over a million copies.
It is not difficult to see why this waltz is so popular. It is an eloquent voice of the “charm, elegance, vivacity, and sophistication” of 19th century Vienna—so much so that it is second only to Haydn’s Austrian National Anthem as the musical symbol of Austria.
Emperor Waltz(Kaiserwalz), op. 437, was written in 1888 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the reign of Franz Joseph I. This is one of Strauss’ most beautiful waltzes. A slow introduction spanning seventy-four bars that has delicacy and grace, and is of a stately march-likecharacter, is Viennese to its very marrow. A suggestion of the main waltz tune then appears quickly but is just as quickly dismissed by a loud return of the main introductory subject. Trombones lead to a brief silence. After some preparation, a waltz melody of rare majesty finally unfolds in the strings. If this wonderful waltz melody can be said to represent the Emperor himself then the delightful waltz tunes that follow—some of almost peasant character—can be said to speak for the joy of the Austrian people in honoring their beloved monarch. An elaborate coda then comes as the crown to the whole composition.
Morning Journals(Morgenblaetter), op. 279, was written for a Viennese press club, the Concordia. Offenbach had previously written for that club a set of waltzes entitled “Evening Journals.” Strauss decided to name his musicMorning Journals. The Offenbach composition is today remembered only because it provided the stimulus for Strauss’ title. But Strauss’ music remains—the four waltzes in his freshest and most infectious lyric vein, and its introduction highlighted by a melody of folk song simplicity.
Roses from the South(Rosen aus dem Sueden), op. 388, is a potpourri of the best waltz tunes (each a delight) from one of the composer’s lesser operettas,Spitzentuch der Koenigen(The Queen’s Lace Handkerchief). The “south” in the title refers to Spain, the background of the operetta, but there is nothing Spanish to this unmistakably Viennese music.
Tales from the Vienna Woods(G’schichten aus dem Wiener Wald), op. 325—performed for the first time by the Strauss orchestra at theNeue Weltcafé in 1868—is a bucolic picture of Nature’s beauty in the forests skirting Vienna. The beauty of Nature is suggested in the stately introduction with its open fifths and its serene melody for cello followed by a flute cadenza. All the loveliness of the Vienna woods is then represented by a waltz melody (originally scored for zither, but now most often presented by strings), a loveliness that is carried on with incomparable grace and charm by the ensuing waltz tunes.
Vienna Blood(Wiener Blut), op. 354, like so many other Strauss waltzes, is a hymn of praise to Strauss’ native cities; but where other waltzes are light and carefree, this one is more often moody, dreamy, and at times sensual. After the introduction come four waltz melodies, the first full of fire and the last one touched with sentimentality. The second and third waltz tunes are interesting for their rhythmic vitality and marked syncopations.
Voices of Spring(Fruehlingstimmen), op. 410—dedicated to the renownedViennese pianist, Albert Gruenfeld—is (like theTales from the Vienna Woods) an exuberant picture of the vernal season, the joy and thrill that the rebirth of Nature always provides to the Viennese.
Wine, Woman and Song(Wein, Weib und Gesang), op. 333, opens with an eloquent mood picture that is virtually an independent composition, even though it offers suggestions of later melodies. This is a spacious ninety-one bar introduction that serves as an eloquent peroration to the four waltz melodies that follow—each graceful, vivacious, and at times tender and contemplative. Richard Wagner, upon hearing Anton Seidl conduct this music, was so moved by it that at one point he seized the baton from Seidl’s hand and conducted the rest of the piece himself.
Strauss wrote other dance music besides waltzes. He was equally successful in bringing his wonderful melodic invention, fine rhythmic sense, and beautiful instrumentation to the Polka, the native Bohemian dance in duple quick time and in a lively mood. The best of the Strauss polkas are:Annen-Polka, op. 117;Electrophor Polka, op. 297 dedicated to the students of a Vienna technical school, its effect derived from its breathless tempo and forceful dynamics;Explosions Polka, op. 43, written when Strauss was only twenty-two and characterized by sudden brief crescendos;Pizzicato Polka, written in collaboration with the composer’s brother Josef, and, as the name indicates, an exercise in plucked strings; and the capriciousTritsch-Tratsch(orChit-Chat)Polka, op. 214.
Of Strauss’ other instrumental compositions, the best known is a lively excursion in velocity calledPerpetual Motion, op. 257, which the composer himself described as a “musical jest.”
Beyond being Vienna’s waltz king, Johann Strauss II was also one of its greatest composers of operettas. Indeed, if a vote were to be cast for the greatest favorite among all Vienna operettas the chances are the choice would fall on Strauss’Die Fledermaus(The Bat), first produced in Vienna on April 5, 1874, book by Carl Haffner and Richard Genée based on a French play by Meilhac and Halévy. This work is not only a classic of the light theater, but even a staple in the repertory of the world’s major opera houses. It is a piece of dramatic intrigue filled with clever, bright and at times risqué humor, as well as irony and gaiety. The plot, in line with operetta tradition, involves a love intrigue: between Rosalinda, wife of Baron von Eisenstein, and Alfred. The Baron is sought by the police for some slight indiscretion, and when they come to the Baron’s home and find Alfred there, they mistakehim for the Baron and arrest him. Upon discovering he is supposed to be in jail, the Baron decides to take full advantage of his liberty by attending a masked ball at Prince Orlovsky’s palace and making advances there to the lovely women. But one of the masked women with whom he flirts is his own wife. Eventually, the identity of both is uncovered, to the embarrassment of the Baron, and this merry escapade ends when the Baron is compelled to spend his time in jail.
The overture is a classic, recreating the effervescent mood that prevails throughout the operetta. It is made up of some of the principal melodies of the opera: Rosalinda’s lament, “So muss allein ich bleiben” first heard in the woodwind; the chorus, “O je, o je, wie ruhrt mich dies” in the strings; and most important of all, the main waltz of the operetta and the climax of the second act, also in the strings.
Other delightful episodes frequently presented in instrumental versions include the lovely drinking song, “Trinke, Liebchen, trinke schnell”; the laughing song of the maid, Adele, “Mein Herr Marquis”; the blood-warming czardas of the “Hungarian countess” who is actually Rosalinda in disguise, “Klaenge der Heimat”; the stirring hymn to champagne, “Die Majistaet wird anerkannt”; and the buoyant waltz, “Du und du.”
The Gypsy Baron(Die Ziguenerbaron) is almost as popular asDie Fledermaus. This is an operetta with libretto by Ignaz Schnitzer, introduced in Vienna on October 24, 1885. Sandór Barinkay returns to his ancestral home after having left it as a child. He finds it swarming with gypsies who have made it their home, and he falls in love with one of them, Saffi.
The overture is made up of material from the concerted finales, beginning with the entrance of the gypsies in the first finale; continuing with Saffi’s celebrated gypsy air, “So elend und treu”; and culminating with the celebrated waltz music of the second act, theSchatz, orTreasure, waltzes.
Other familiar excerpts include Sandór’s exuberant aria with chorus from the first act “Ja, das alles auf Ehr,” probably the most celebrated vocal excerpt from the entire operetta; and theEntry March(Einzugmarsch) from the third act—for chorus and orchestra in the operetta, but often given by salon ensembles in an orchestral version.
Josef Strauss, like Eduard, is a younger brother of Johann Strauss II, and son of Johann Strauss I. He was born in Vienna on August 22, 1827. He was an extremely talented young man not only in music but even as architect and inventor. Of more serious and sober disposition than either of his two brothers, he long regarded café-house music condescendingly, his musical preference being for the classics. His famous brother, Johann Strauss II, needing someone to help him direct his orchestra, finally prevailed on Josef to turn to café-house music. Josef made his debut as café-house conductor and composer simultaneously on July 23, 1853, his first waltz beingDie Ersten. After that he often substituted for brother Johann in directing the latter’s orchestra in Vienna and on extended tours of Europe and Russia. Josef died in Vienna on July 21, 1870.
Josef Strauss wrote almost three hundred dance compositions. Though certainly less inspired than his brother, Johann, he was also far more important than Eduard. Josef’s best waltzes have much of the lyrical invention, and the harmonic and instrumental invention of those by Johann Strauss II. Perhaps his greatest waltz is theDorfschwalben aus Oesterreich(Swallows from Austria), op. 164, a nature portrait often interrupted by the chirping of birds. Here Josef’s outpouring of the most sensitive lyricism and delicate moods is hardly less wondrous than that of Johann Strauss II. H. E. Jacob went so far as to say that “since Schubert’s death there has been no such melody. It is in the realm of the Impromptus and Moments Musicaux. It breathes the sweet blue from which the swallows come.”
Another Josef Strauss classic in three-quarter time isSphaerenklaenge(Music of the Spheres), op. 285, equally remarkable for its spontaneous flow of unforgettable waltz tunes. Among Strauss’ other delightful waltzes are theAquarellen, op. 258;Delirien, op. 212;Dynamiden, op. 173;Marienklaenge, op. 214. A theme fromDynamidenwaltzes was used by Richard Strauss in his famous operaDer Rosenkavalier.
In collaboration with his brother, Johann, Josef wrote the famousPizzicato Polkaand several other pieces including theMonstrequadrilleandVaterlandischer March. With Johann and Eduard he wrote theSchuetzenquadrilleand theTrifolienwalzer.
Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan—musical half of the comic-opera team of Gilbert and Sullivan—was born in London, England, on May 13, 1842. The son of a bandmaster, Sullivan was appointed to the Chapel Royal School in 1854. One year after that his first published composition appeared, an anthem. In 1856 he was the first recipient of the recently instituted Mendelssohn Award which entitled him to attend the Royal Academy of Music where he studied under Sterndale Bennett and Goss. From 1858 to 1861 he attended the Leipzig Conservatory. After returning to London in 1862, he achieved recognition as a serious composer with several ambitious compositions including theIrish Symphony, a cello concerto, a cantata, and an oratorio. Meanwhile, in 1866, he had become professor of composition at the Royal Academy, and in 1867 he completed his first score in a light style, the comic operaCox and Box, libretto by F. C. Burnand, which enjoyed a successful engagement in London.
In 1871, a singer introduced Sullivan to W. S. Gilbert, a one-time attorney who had attracted some interest in London as the writer of burlesques. An enterprising impresario, John Hollingshead of the Gaiety Theater, then was responsible for getting Gilbert and Sullivan to work on their first operetta. This wasThespis, produced in London in 1871, and a failure. It was several years before librettist and composer worked together again. When they did it was for a new impresario, Richard D’Oyly Carte, for whom they wrote a one-act comic opera,Trial by Jury, a curtain raiser to a French operetta which Carte was producing in London on March 25, 1875.Trial by Jury—a stinging satire on court trials revolving around a breach of promise suit—inauguratesthe epoch of Gilbert and Sullivan. D’Oyly Carte now commissioned Gilbert and Sullivan to create a new full length comic opera for a company he had recently formed. The new light opera company made a successful bow withThe Sorcerer, on November 17, 1877.Pinafore, a year later on May 25, 1878, made Gilbert and Sullivan a vogue and a passion both in London and in New York. In 1879 Gilbert and Sullivan came to the United States where on December 31 they introduced a new comic opera,The Pirates of Penzance, that took the country by storm. Upon returning to London, Gilbert and Sullivan opened a new theater built for them by D’Oyly Carte—the Savoy—withPatience, a tumultuous success on April 25, 1881. After that cameIolanthe(1882),Princess Ida(1884),The Mikado(1885), theYeomen of the Guard(1888) andThe Gondoliers(1889).
Gilbert and Sullivan came to the parting of the ways in 1890, the final rift precipitated by a silly argument over the cost of a carpet for the Savoy Theater. But the differences between them had long been deep rooted. An attempt to revive the partnership was made in 1893 withUtopia Limited, and again withThe Grand Dukein 1896. Both comic operas were failures.
After 1893, Sullivan wrote a grand opera,Ivanhoe, and several operetta scores to librettists other than Sullivan. None of these were successful. During the last years of his life he suffered from deterioration of his health, and was almost always in acute pain. He died in London on November 22, 1900. Gilbert died eleven years after that.
Of Sullivan’s other achievements in the field of music mention must be made of his importance as a conductor of the concerts of the London Philharmonic from 1885 to 1887, and of the Leeds Festival from 1880 to 1898. Between 1876 and 1881 he was principal of, and professor of composition at, the National Training School for Music. In recognition of his high estate in English music, he was the recipient of many honors. In 1878 he was made Chevalier of the Legion of Honor, and in 1883 he was knighted by Queen Victoria.
It is irony fitting for a Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera that the music on which Sullivan lavished his most fastidious attention and of which he was most proud has been completely forgotten (except for one or two minor exceptions). But the music upon which he looked with such condescension and self apology is that which has made him an immortal—in the theater if not in the concert world. For where Sullivan was heavy-handed, pretentious, and often stilted in his oratorios, serious operas, and orchestral compositions, he was consistently vital,fresh, personal, and vivacious in his lighter music. In setting Gilbert’s lyrics to music, Sullivan was always capable of finding the musicalmot justeto catch every nuance of Gilbert’s wit and satire. So neatly, even inevitably, does the music fit the words that it is often difficult to think of one without the other. Like Gilbert, Sullivan was a master of parody and satire; he liked particularly to mock at the pretensions of grand opera, oratorio, and the sentimental ballad, pretensions of which he himself was a victim when he endeavored to work in those fields. Like Gilbert, he had a pen that raced with lightning velocity in the writing of patter music to patter verses. Sullivan, moreover, had a reservoir of melodies seemingly inexhaustible—gay tunes, mocking tunes, and tunes filled with telling sentiment—and he was able to adapt the fullest resources of his remarkable gift at harmony, rhythm and orchestration to the manifold demands of the stage. He was no man’s imitator. Without having recourse to experimentation or unorthodox styles and techniques, his style and manners were so uniquely his that, as T. F. Dunhill has said, “his art is always recognizable.... The Sullivan touch is unmistakable and can be felt instantly.”
Of the universality of the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas, Isaac Goldberg wrote: “They [Gilbert and Sullivan] were not the rebels of an era, yet as surely they were not the apologists. Their light laughter carried a pleasant danger of its own that, without being the laughter of a Figaro, helped before the advent of a Shaw to keep the atmosphere clear. Transition figures they were, in an age of transition, caught between the personal independence of the artist and the social imperatives of their station. They did not cross over into the new day, though they served as a footbridge for others. Darwin gave them ... only a song forPrincess Ida, their melodious answer to the revolt of woman against a perfumed slavery; Swinburne and Wilde ... characters forPatience. They chided personal foibles, and only indirectly social abuses. They were, after all, moralists not sociologists. It was in their natures; it was of their position. Yet something vital in them lives beyond their time. From their era of caste, of smug rectitude, of sanctimoniousness, they still speak to an age that knows neither corset nor petticoat, that votes with its women, and finds Freud insufficiently aphrodisiac. Perhaps it is because they chide individuals and not institutions that their work, so admirably held in solution by Sullivan’s music, has lived through the most critical epoch in modern history since the French Revolution. For, underneath the cataclysmic changes of history remain the foibles that make us the fit laughter of the gods.”