Eduard Strauss

Grave in the Vienna Central Cemetery

Eduard Strauss (born March 15, 1835 in Leopoldstadt , today Vienna , † December 28, 1916 in Vienna) was an Austrian composer and conductor .

Life

"Edi" Strauss, silhouette by Otto Böhler

Eduard Strauss was the youngest son of Johann Strauss (father) and brother of Johann Strauss (son) and Josef Strauss . The “place of his youth”, the Hirschenhaus , was located at Taborstrasse 17, Vienna-Leopoldstadt .

After graduating from the Academic Gymnasium in Vienna, he aspired to a diplomatic career, but ultimately let his brother Johann Strauss (son) choose him as a musician, just like his other brother Josef Strauss had previously done. He trained in music theory with the Vienna Cathedral Kapellmeister Gottfried von Preyer (1807–1901), took violin lessons from Franz Amon, the concertmaster of the Strauss Chapel, and studied this instrument with the harp virtuoso Anton Zamara (1829–1901) he also used to play the piano.

At the charity ball for Johann on February 11, 1855 in the Sophiensaal , Eduard made his debut as a harpist in Johann's waltz “Glosses” op. 163. Eduard made his debut as conductor of the Strauss Chapel at the benefit ball under the motto “Carnevals Perpetuum Mobile or: The dance without end “On February 5, 1861 - again - in the Sophiensaal, where three orchestras, each led by one of the three Strauss brothers, played.

Right from the start of his career, Eduard Strauss was judged by the public and the press by the successes of his brothers, especially Johanns, and, especially in Vienna, was deemed not to be equal. But he consistently put himself at the service of the family business. When Johann surprisingly married in the summer of 1862 and Josef had to represent him in Pavlovsk, Eduard held the position in Vienna.

After Josef's death (1870) and Johann's turn to composing operettas , Eduard took over the sole direction of the orchestra for over 30 years, which under his leadership and tight organization became one of the most outstanding ensembles in Vienna and internationally. With him, the Strauss Chapel became a first-rate cultural institution for Vienna and Austria. In 1872 Eduard was awarded the title "kk court ball music director" due to his services to the performance of entertaining music at events of the Austrian imperial family.

With his newly introduced Sunday afternoon concerts in the winter season in the Great Hall of the newly constructed building of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna , he made an indispensable contribution to the musical life of this city for over 30 years from March 1870. He not only performed works by the Strauss family here, but also a great many compositions from the classical and romantic repertoire of the 18th and 19th centuries, from Mozart to Wagner , and many compositions by his brother Johann were performed here for the first time under his direction.

The obituary notice in the NFP of December 30, 1916

In addition to the numerous Viennese commitments, such as the regular concerts in the Volksgarten , in the " New World " or in the flower rooms , from 1878 he regularly undertook extensive summer tours through Germany with the Strauss Chapel, guest performances in London in 1885 and 1890 , and in 1890 and in winter 1900/1901 such in the United States . "I have performed with my chapel in 840 cities in two parts of the world ...", he summed up in his "Memories" published in 1906. Conductor and orchestra achieved great success on these concert tours. He spread his family's music around the world. In 1901 he dissolved his orchestra and retired into private life. In 1907 he arranged for and supervised the burning of the huge music archive of the Strauss Chapel, supposedly in order to fulfill a promise to his deceased brother Josef, which however could never be proven as such.

Eduard Strauss married Maria Klenkhart on January 8, 1863 (July 13, 1840, Leopoldstadt - April 16, 1921, Vienna, IV.). From this marriage came two sons, Johann Strauss (grandson) (1866–1939), who also became a musician, and Josef Eduard Strauss (1868–1940), who from 1897 - when he was already thinking of his retirement - temporarily in difficult financial circumstances Brought distress, and in order to rehabilitate the second American tour at the turn of the century. At the end of a railway accident in Pittsburgh on February 13, 1901, 78 years after it was founded, the orchestra was dissolved.

He was unable to attend the funeral of his brother Johann because of his obligations in Munich.

Eduard Strauss died of a heart attack on December 28, 1916. On January 4, 1917, the Vienna City Council decided that he would be buried in a grave of honor: He was buried in a grave of honor (Group 32 A, number 42) at the Vienna Central Cemetery. On September 26, 1991, a memorial plaque was unveiled on his former home at Reichsratsstrasse 9, Vienna-Innere Stadt . As the only member of the Strauss dynasty , he himself wrote his last name with ß , but was immortalized in the obituary and on his tombstone with an ss .

Works

Eduard Strauss composed over 300 dances and marches, almost all of which appeared in print. There are barely ten percent of these in today's repertoire, and a good three times as many are waiting to be rediscovered. Some of them are clear (op. 45, Polka fast) and Ohne Bremse , the latter composed for the railway ball in the Golden Hall of the Vienna Musikverein. Another is called the telephone and is dedicated to its inventor. He also arranged around 200 works by other composers for the Strauss Chapel.

literature

Constantin von Wurzbach : Strauss, Eduard . In: Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich . 39th part. Kaiserlich-Königliche Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, Vienna 1879, pp. 322–325 ( digitized version ).
Eduard Strauss [sic]: “Memories” . Franz Deuticke, Leipzig and Vienna, 1906. (autobiography, which, however, is verifiably flawed).
Strauss Eduard. In: Austrian Biographical Lexicon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Volume 13, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 2007–2010,ISBN 978-3-7001-6963-5, p. 374 f. (Direct links on p. 374 , p. 375 ).
Eduard Strauss : Eduard Strauss (1835 - 1916): Testament of February 3, 1914, including addendum of April 27, 1916 Annual edition of the Vienna Institute for Strauss Research. Schneider , Tutzing 2000. ISBN 978-3-7952-1033-5
Leigh Bailey: Eduard Strauss: the third man of the Strauss Family , Hollitzer, Vienna 2017, ISBN 978-3-99012-355-3

Web links

Commons : Eduard Strauss - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Works by and about Eduard Strauss in the catalog of the German National Library
Original manuscripts by Eduard Strauss in the Vienna Library
Works by Eduard Strauss

Individual evidence

^ ^A ^b Anton Krispin: Local News. Eduard Strauss. In: Badener Zeitung , August 16, 1913, p. 5, center right. (Online at ANNO ).

↑ "memories." In: archive.org. Retrieved May 13, 2016 .

^ Joseph Wechsberg: The waltz emperors - the life and times and music of the Strauss family . (English). Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London 1973, ISBN 0-297-76594-9 , p. 159.

^ Memoirs, pp. 125-131.