Johann Strauss II
Johann Strauss, Jr. is the first truly well-known composer in those classical genres particular to his hometown, the Viennese waltz and Viennese operetta. The Blue Danube Waltz is not only the most popular of his works in the former category, but is among the most widely played and arranged pieces of its time, known to the most casual listener today from many radio, film and television uses of it.
Johann Strauss, Jr. was born in Vienna on October 25, 1825. He showed remarkable skills early in his childhood, despite his father's opposition to any career in music for any of his three sons. Johann, Sr. wanted him to become a banker, but the younger Strauss had his own ideas, taking violin lessons in secret from a player in his father's band. When Strauss was 17 his father left the family, thus allowing him to begin serious study without encumbrance. His mother, a good amateur violinist who had always encouraged him, remained supportive. Strauss now studied theory with Joseph Drechsler and took violin lessons from Anton Kohlmann. In 1844 young Johann led his first concert and a year later formed his own band, thereby competing with his father's orchestra. He was also writing his own quadrilles, mazurkas, polkas, and waltzes for performance by his ensemble, even conducting works by his father, and receiving praise from the press. He was given the honorary position of Bandmaster of the 2nd Vienna Citizens' Regiment (his father was bandmaster of the 1st regiment) in 1845, and in 1847 began composing for the Vienna Men's Choral Association.
His real success began in 1849 after Johann Strauss, Sr. died. Johann, Jr. merged his father's orchestra with his own and took up his father's contracts. His career moved along smoothly for the next several years, but in 1853 he became seriously ill and turned over conducting duties to his younger brother, Josef, for six months. After his recovery he resumed fully both his conducting and his composing activities, eventually gaining the respect of such composers as Brahms, Wagner, and Verdi for his seemingly unlimited imagination for using melodies.
Strauss married singer Henriette "Jetty" Treffz in August 1862, and they settled in Hietzing. Thereafter, she became his business manager and apparently a great inspiration, drawing him toward operetta, just as Viennese theater operators were becoming tired of the works of Offenbach. His first, Indigo und die vierzig Räuber, came in 1871, and his most famous, Die Fledermaus, was staged three years later with great success. Eine Nacht in Venedig (1883) and Der Zigeunerbaron (1885) were his only other international operetta hits.
In 1872, he traveled to the United States and led highly successful concerts in Boston and New York. For all the success that came in the 1870s for Strauss, there was also much grief: his mother and brother Josef died in 1870, and his wife died suddenly of a heart attack in 1878. Her death devastated him, and the suddenly helpless composer unwisely married the much-younger actress Angelika Dittrich, six weeks later. The marriage lasted only four years, though it may have saved the composer from personal disaster in the months following his wife's death.
Strauss, a Roman Catholic, left the church and had to give up his Austrian citizenship to marry Adele Deutsch in 1887, owing to the Church's unwillingness to recognize his divorce. His new wife, with whom he had lived for a long period before their marriage, seemed to inspire him much like his first wife. In his last years, Strauss remained quite productive and active. He was working on a ballet, Cinderella, when he developed a respiratory ailment which grew into pneumonia. He died on June 3, 1899.
© Robert Cummings /TiVo
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Johann Strauss: Die Fledermaus
Erich Binder, Johann Strauss II, Vienna Volksoper Orchestra
Classical - Released by Denon on 1 Jan 2010
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J. Strauss II: An Introduction
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on 18 Jul 2020
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Aquellos Maravillos Años... de Música Inolvidable
Classical - Released by ClassicalPirosDigital on 3 Sep 2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
100 Must-Have Operetta Melodies
Classical - Released by Cobra Entertainment LLC on 21 Jan 2014
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Strauss: Perpetuum mobile (Perpetual Motion), Op. 257 (Digitally Remastered)
Moscow RTV Symphony Orchestra, Guennadi Rosdhestvenski
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on 29 Jun 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Strauss: Die Fledermaus (The Bat): Overture (Digitally Remastered)
Prague Symphony Orchestra, Vaclav Smetacek
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on 29 Jun 2014
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The Most Beautiful Johann Strauss Waltzes
Classical - Released by Tuxedo Music on 30 Apr 2013
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Strauss II.: Waltzes & Polkas
Classical - Released by Blaricum CD Company (B.C.D.) B.V. on 11 Feb 2014
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Strauss in Vienna
Chamber Music - Released by Nimbus Records on 20 Jan 1998
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Au revoir 2020!
Johann Strauss II, Ludwig van Beethoven, Antonio Vivaldi
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on 26 Dec 2020
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Johann ll Strauss, Die Fledermaus
Classical - Released by Classical.com Music on 16 Feb 2009
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Strauss: An der schönen blauen Donau (The Blue Danube), Op. 314 (Digitally Remastered)
Vienna Volksoper Orchestra, Peter Falk
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on 29 Jun 2014
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Musica para Bodas
Classical - Released by Andrius & Rospi Digital on 8 Jan 2016
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Great Classical Hits
Classical - Released by Classic Records on 16 Mar 2017
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Frohes neues Jahr!
Josef Strauss, Johann Strauss II
Classical - Released by UME - Global Clearing House on 31 Dec 2020
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Strauss: Künstlerleben (Artist's Life), Op. 316 (Digitally Remastered)
Vienna Volksoper Orchestra, Peter Falk
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on 29 Jun 2014
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Johann ll Strauss, Tales From The Vienna Woods, Op. 325
Classical - Released by Classical.com Music on 16 Feb 2009
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Egyptian March
Johann Strauss II, Eugene Ormandy, Philadelphia Orchestra
Classical - Released by Vintage Jukebox on 23 Jun 2023
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Classical Masterpieces of the Millennium: Strauss II
Classical - Released by Cobra Entertainment LLC on 29 Oct 2013
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Los Más Bellos Valses y Polkas
Classical - Released by Piros - Artyvoz on 31 Oct 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
100 Must-Have Austrian Classics
Classical - Released by Cobra Entertainment LLC on 18 Nov 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo