Strauss, R: Piano Sonata / 5 Piano Pieces / Stimmungsbilder

Stefan Veselka

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Cat No: 8557713

Release Date: 10 January 2006

Label: Naxos - Nxc / Naxos Classics

Packaging Type: Jewel Case

No of Units: 1

Barcode: 747313271320

Genres: Classical

Composer/Series: STRAUSS, R

Description
Richard Strauss (1864-1949) Piano Music, Opp. 3, 5 and 9 The German composer and conductor Richard Strauss represents a remarkable extension of the work of Liszt and Wagner in the symphonic poems of his earlier career. Born in Munich, the son of a distinguished horn-player and his second wife, a member of a rich brewing family, he had a sound general education there, while studying music under teachers of obvious distinction. Before he left school in 1882 he had already enjoyed some success as a composer, continued during his brief period at Munich University with the composition of concertos for violin and for French horn and a sonata for cello and piano. By the age of 21 he had been appointed assistant conductor to the well-known orchestra at Meiningen under Hans von Bülow, whom he succeeded in the following year.In 1886 Strauss resigned from Meiningen and began the series of tone-poems that seemed to extend to the utmost limit the extra-musical content of the form. The first of these works, Aus Italien (From Italy), was followed by Macbeth, Don Juan, Tod und Verklärung (Death and Transfiguration) and, after a gap of a few years, Till Eulenspiegel, Also sprach Zarathustra (Thus spake Zarathustra), Don Quixote and Ein Heldenleben (A Hero's Life). Meanwhile Strauss was establishing his reputation as a conductor, directing the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra for a season and taking appointments in Munich and then in 1898 at the opera in Berlin, where he later became Court Composer.The new century brought a renewed attention to opera, after earlier relative failure. Salome in Dresden in 1905 was followed in 1909 by Elektra, the start of a continuing collaboration with Hugo von Hofmannsthal. Der Rosenkavalier (The Knight of the Rose), a romantic opera set in the Vienna of Mozart, was staged at the Court Opera in Dresden in 1911, followed by ten further operas, ending only with Capriccio, mounted at the Staatsoper in Munich in 1942. His final years were clouded by largely unfounded accusations of collaboration with the musical policies of the Third Reich and after 1945 he withdrew for a time to Switzerland, returning to his own house at Garmisch only four months before his death in 1949.While still at school, Strauss was a proficient pianist. At the same time he showed obvious gifts as a composer. He had had his first piano lessons at the age of four with his father's colleague in the Munich Court orchestra, August Tombo. His first known composition, Schneider-Polka for piano was written two years later, in 1870, the year in which he entered the Munich cathedral school. He began violin lessons in 1872 with his father's cousin, Benno Walter, leader of the Court Orchestra, who was to lead a performance of Strauss's String Quartet in A, Op. 2, in 1881. At the Ludwigs-gymnasium, where Strauss began his studies at the age of ten, there were varied musical opportunities. From 1875 he had piano lessons wit
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