Richard Strauss: News

Richard Strauss was German composer and orchestra director. Explore interesting quotes on news.
Richard Strauss: 62   quotes 4   likes

“Why don't people see what is new in my work, how in them, as is found only in Beethoven, the human being visibly plays a part in the work.”

Richard Strauss

19th June 1949, in Willi Schuh, Strauss the early years, 1982, Cambridge University Press, page xiii.
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People , Parting

“Strauss told me about his new ballet, which he wrote in the summer. It’s called ‘Schlagobers’ (whipped cream) and he said, jokingly: ‘Oh yes, when one gets old one has ideas like that.”

Richard Strauss

In America with Richard Strauss. Elisabeth Schumann’s Travel Diary (14th October to 31st December 1921). Elisabeth Schumann was a soprano who worked with Strauss in the 1920s and 1930s. He dedicated his Brentano Lieder to her.
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Idea , Summer

“Producers of opera nowadays usually make the mistake of translating each particular orchestral phrase into terms of a movement on the stage. In this matter one should proceed with a maximum of caution and good taste. There is no objection to bringing life to into the production by changes of position and new nuances of acting during repetitive passages of music, especially in arias. Preludes of one or two bars frequently, and especially in Mozart, clearly express some gesture on stage. But each trill on the flute does not represent a wink on the prima donna, nor every delayed chord on the strings a step or gesture. Whole passages, especially in the finales, are pure concert music and are best left undisturbed by “play acting.””

Richard Strauss

Recollections and Reflections

Life , Music , Change

“It is clear to me that the German nation will achieve new creative energy only by liberating itself from Christianity”

Richard Strauss

Diary entry, shortly after the death of Gustav Mahler (1911). Quoted in Oxford University Press, Grove music online: Strauss, Richard, §7: Instrumental works (written by Bryan Gilliam and Charles Youmans).
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