Release Date: 08 January 2000
Label: Naxos - Nxc / Naxos Classics
Packaging Type: Jewel Case
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 636943417522
Genres: Classical
Composer/Series: STRAUSS, R.
Description
Richard Strauss(1864-1949)Don Quixote, Op. 35 Romance in F major forcello and orchestra, A V 75The German composer and conductor Richard Strauss represents aremarkable extension of the work of Liszt and Wagner in the symphonic poems ofhis early career. Born in Munich, the son of a distinguished horn-player andhis second wife, a member of a rich brewing family, he had a sound generaleducation at there, while studying music under teachers of obvious distinction.Before he left school in 1882 he had already enjoyed some success as acomposer, continued during his brief period at Munich University with thecomposition of concertos for violin and for French horn and a sonata for celloand piano. By the age of twenty-one he had been appointed assistant conductorto the well-known orchestra at Meiningen under Hans von B??low, whom hesucceeded in the following year.In 1886 Strauss resigned from Meiningen and began the series oftone-poems that seemed to extend to the utmost limit the extra-musical contentof the form. The first of these works, Aus Italien ('From Italy'), wasfollowed by Macbeth, Dan Juan, Tod und Verklarung ('Death andTransfiguration') and, after a gap of a few years, Till Eulenspiegel, Alsosprach Zarathustra ('Thus Spake Zarathustra'), Don Quixote and EinHeldenleben (A Hero's Life). Meanwhile Strauss was establishing hisreputation as a conductor, directing the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra for aseason and taking appointments in Munich and then at the opera in Berlin, wherehe later became Court Composer.The new century brought a renewed attention to opera, after earlierrelative failure. Salome in Dresden in 1905 was followed in 1909 by Elektra,the start of a continuing collaboration with Hugo von Hoffmanns?¡thal. DerRosenkavalier ('The Knight of the Rose'), a romantic opera set in theVienna of Mozart, was staged at the Court Opera in Dresden in 1911, followed byten further operas, ending only with Capriccio, mounted at theStaatsoper in Munich in 1942. His final years were clouded by largely unfoundedaccusations of collaboration with the musical policies of the Third Reich andafter 1945 he withdrew for a time to Switzerland, returning to his own house atGarmisch only four months before his death in 1949.Don Quixote, Fantastic Variations on a Theme of Knightly Character, was written in 1897and first performed on 8th March the following year in Cologne at the G??rzenichunder Franz W??llner. The work is the whimsical counterpart of EinHeldenleben, first performed a year later. Don Quixote was notoriginally conceived as a concerto and the solo cello part was at firstintended for the leader of the cello section. Eventually, however, Straussconceded the part to a soloist, in view of the technical demands it made andthe prominence of the instrument through much of the work.The picaresque novel by Miguel Cervantes, El Ingenioso Hidalgo DonQuijote de la Moncha, was published in two parts, in 1605 and 1615. Asimple country gentleman has his head turned by
Tracklisting
Dariia Lytvishko
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra; Marin Alsop
Alice Di Piazza; Basel Sinfonietta; NDR Bigband; Titus Engel
Anna Alas i Jove; Miquel Villalba
David Childs; Black Dyke Band; Nicholas Childs
Yaqi Yang; Margarita Parsamyan; Robynne Redmon; Minghao Liu; Frank Ragsdale; Kim Josephson; Kevin S
Vilmos Csikos; Olivier Lechardeur; Manon Lamaison
Tomas Cotik; Martingale Ensemble; Ken Selden
