Strauss 200: The musical legacy of Johann Strauss II. скачать в хорошем качестве

Strauss 200: The musical legacy of Johann Strauss II.

A performance of The Blue Danube with illustrations of Johann Strauss’s musical legacy, to celebrate his 200th birthday, 25 October 2025. 00:00 - Introduction 01:40 - The Strauss Sixth and the Strauss Ninth 05:12 - The Strauss Century 08:26 - The Blue Danube Erratum: The year shown at 00:12 should be 1849! Sources, links and commentary: The Ost-Deutsche Post page is from the National Library of Austria: https://alex.onb.ac.at/cgi-content/an... The terms “Strauss sixth” and “Strauss ninth”, meaning added sixth and ninth chords where the added note is in the melody and brazen (as I put it), are my own. A good reference on composers’ increasing freedom with the sixth note of a major scale is the 2002 paper “The rise of 6 in the Nineteenth Century” by Jeremy Davy-O’Connell. Also relevant is a 2023 paper by Henry Martin, “On the Tonic Added-Sixth Chord in Jazz.” Martin says more about Strauss than does Davy-O’Connell. Neither notes how Strauss uses melody sixths and ninths, whatever chord they are the sixth/ninth of. It isn’t just tonic sixths and dominant ninths; he’s keen on others too. I show examples in the Blue Danube (eg in waltz 2a), and Strauss has them elsewhere. Another good reference is Derek B Scott’s book, “Sounds of the Metropolis: The 19th Century Popular Music Revolution in London, New York, Paris and Vienna”, in which I found the example of “Bring me sunshine”. Richard Taruskin in “The Oxford History of Western Music” notes: “There is one stylistic idiosyncrasy in particular that went from [Johann Strauss II] into the general idiom of European (or European-style) music, and that is the freedom with which the sixth degree of the scale is harmonized...” Again, I think this misses the brashness (brazenness, in-your-face-ness) of Strauss’s sixths and ninths. Of my examples in other composers, I suspect Davy-O’Connell would challenge my link from Strauss to Mahler, and so might Mahler. The character of Mack the Knife is strongly Straussian. Famously George Martin thought The Beatles singing an added sixth at the end of She Loves You would sound cheesy. But the Harrison note is a strong Strauss sixth, not a jazzy or swing-derived sixth. The Beatles did use jazzy sixths (eg in Michelle and The Fool on the Hill), but another place they used a Strauss sixth – Help – suggests they understood the major/minor effect. A clip from The Sound of Music illustrates Laendler, and dramatic interpretations are from the 1972 ATV Series, The Strauss Family, now available on the Classic British Telly Youtube channel. Highly recommended though sometimes soapy. I doubt the Derek-Jacobi-as-Lanner-in-a-punch-up clip is historically accurate. Eleanor Knight’s comment on the raciness of the Viennese waltz comes from: https://bachtrack.com/feature-strauss... . She also writes, “There is something about the Blue Danube waltz that whoever, or whatever, is listening, goes to the core of who we are as a species,” which is intriguing, but she doesn’t elaborate. The picture of Henrietta Treffz is the front cover of Die drei Leben der Jetty Treffz (The three lives of Jetty Treffz) by Peter Sommeregger, summarized at http://operetta-research-center.org/t... Disputed anecdotes include: whether Strauss actually performed The Blue Danube in Boston, whether Wagner characterised Strauss as “the most musical man in Europe” or “the most musical head I have come across” (or both), whether it was Adele or her daughter who asked Brahms for his autograph. The newspaper poll anecdote comes from the Spectator: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/w... The final section on the Blue Danube draws mainly on the WISF research snippet: https://www.johann-strauss.at/en/fors... . This page contradicts some of the received wisdom, particularly about the quality of Josef Weyl’s lyrics and the reception of the first performance. The clip that plays during discussion of the premiere features the Cologne Male Voice choir -    • An der schönen blauen Donau (Donauwalzer) ...   . They are not singing Weyl’s original words but later ones by Franz von Gernerth. The clips from movies that feature The Blue Danube on their soundtracks are discussed in my video Free… To Be Alike:    • The Blue Danube Paradox: When musicians wi...   Sarah Willis’ video on the Viennese waltz --    • 1,2 and maybe 3 - the Viennese Waltz | wit...   -- gives tips on contrabass performance. My previous videos on the Blue Danube: The Viennese Lilt:    • The Viennese Lilt: Finding the Groove for ...   Free… to be Alike: The Blue Danube Paradox:    • The Blue Danube Paradox: When musicians wi...   Muse versus Strauss:    • How a Strauss waltz triggers the worst of ...   The first two explain some choices in this performance, which uses Musescore and Muse Sounds.