Richard Strauss Concert Overture

Author: Richard Strauss
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-04-01
Features: In a letter to the Graz musicologist Friedrich von Hu?gel in 1892, Richard Strauss wrote that his creative output between 1872 and 1882 was extremely prolific, indeed, "too much, too." If we examine the works of Strauss's youth, we are bound to ask the following question: How could this precocious child, born in 1864, so effortlessly, so frequently, and so successfully compose perfectly structured works in the styles of Mendelssohn or Schumann during his secondary school years? This "Symphonic Prelude" marks the successful step he took toward becoming a master in the future—especially, this work helped elevate his name beyond Munich. In his memoir "My Youth and My Apprenticeship Years," Strauss himself described this prelude as "not bad, influenced by the 'Coriolan' Overture, and he personally conducted the premiere of this work in Meiningen in 1886 and in Dresden in 1888.