Johann Strauss Snr • Edition • Vol. 3

 

[1] Es ist nur ein Wien! Walzer, Op. 22 (There is only one Vienna! Waltz)

 

For his benefit ball in the Chain-Bridge ballroom, which was held on 17th February 1829, Johann Strauss wrote his first tribute to his native city, the Es ist nur ein Wien! waltz. It is very simply orchestrated for flute, two clarinets, two horns, one trumpet, percussion, two violins, viola, and bass. The structure too is uncomplicated with six waltzes of sixteen or eight bars, one following another, with only the third waltz in three parts, with the third part exceptionally having ten bars. The energetic 43-bar coda is very effective. There is an apt title-page for the piano edition, published by Tobias Haslinger on 27th May 1829, with a silhouette of Vienna, with its towers rising up to the sky, and the hills of the Vienna woods, Kahlenberg and Leopoldsberg, clearly recognisable.

 

There are pleasing motifs that give this declaration of love for his native city a particular charm. The strings provide a pizzicato accompaniment to the Viennese melody of the first waltz, followed by the other parts varying in mood from the high-spirited and somewhat elegiac to motifs reminiscent of Ländler.

 

In the performance of the waltz it can clearly be heard that the period of grinding out short motifs in triple time was past. Certainly Johann Strauss had not yet discovered the definitive form of the waltz. His friend and now often his rival Joseph Lanner, whom Strauss was to supersede in October 1829 at the Sperl, a famous establishment much respected for its music directors, was also not yet at that point. Nevertheless the development of the simple dance into an art work had begun and would lead to internationally acclaimed results and to the master-works of the Strauss family and Lanner. Perhaps it can be said that Es ist nur ein Wien! stands at the beginning of the spread of Austrian music beyond national borders and to the world.

 

[2] Hirten-Galoppe, Op. 28 (Shepherd Galop)

 

Johann Strauss composed his Shepherd Galop for a larger ensemble. He wrote parts for one flute, one oboe, two clarinets, two horns, one bassoon, two trumpets and one trombone. The work was written either during the carnival or in the summer of 1829. In these months Johann Strauss was again music director at The Two Pigeons and at The Chain-Bridge. From October 1829 he was music director at the then already famous Sperl, a position he held, with a short interruption, until his death in 1849. The appearance of the piano edition of the work was announced in the Wiener Zeitung on 20th November 1829 and of course it was included in the collection Favourite Galops for the Piano.

 

Strauss had not taken too much trouble over this galop. After the first part, consisting of twice eight bars, which is repeated, comes a simple but very effective trio, also with eight bars twice. The slightly varied finale of 32 bars offers a brilliant conclusion. It is not hard to imagine how the dancers romped through the ball-room to these tunes.

 

[3] Josephstädter-Tänze [Walzer], Op. 23 (Josephstadt Dances, Waltz)

Performed in the Garden Salon of the Theatre Building

 

The title-page of the piano edition of the Josephstadt Dances, which was issued by Tobias Haslinger on 12th August 1829, indicates the place of the first performance, the Garden Salon in the Josephstadt theatre building, which then belonged to a subsequently extended and famous inn, The [Golden] Ostrich. The flightless African bird can also be seen on the title-page. The date of the first performance, however, is not known, although the instrumentation for small orchestra suggests 1828.

 

The waltz is a simple, but agreeable and cheerful work, firmly rooted in Viennese tradition, but includes so many individual accents, as in the melodic structure in Waltz 3a of the six-part work, which starts up strongly at once without introduction and also ends with a strong, short coda. In the years from 1845 to 1847 the younger Johann Strauss played the dance in the then much larger ball-room of the same Golden Ostrich. For this place he wrote some cheerful polkas and interesting waltzes. His father later only seldom returned to this establishment and gave no more first performances there.

 

[4] Wettrennen-Galoppe, Op. 29[a] (Races Galop)

 

The publisher Tobias Haslinger had included the galops written in 1829 by Johann Strauss as No.28 and No.29 in his Favourite Galops, which was announced in the Wiener Zeitung on 20th November 1829.

 

The races introduced to Vienna by English gentlemen but promoted by the excellent horsemen of the Austrian nobility were first held in the Vienna Prater, but then exiled to the Simmering fields, since at the races the many spectators made so much noise with their attempts to cheer the riders on that it seemed to be disturbing the hunting and game on the Imperial Prater. It was of no concern to the friends and followers of the sport whether the races should be held in the Prater or Simmering. They did not let it bother them and the winners were also given in the newspapers.

 

Whether Johann Strauss had attended such races is not known. His spirited, rhythmic, originally arranged Races Galop reflects the mood on the battlefield and remains an element in Viennese musical repertoire.

 

[5] Hietzinger-Reunion-Walzer (Hietzing Reunion Waltz) or

Weissgärber-Kirchweih-Tänze, Op. 24 (Weissgarb Parish Fair Dances)

 

On 11th September 1829 the publisher Tobias Haslinger issued, as he had announced in the Wiener Zeitung, a new waltz by Johann Strauss as Op.24 with the double title Hietzing Reunion Waltz or Weissgarb Parish Fair Dances. This indicates the districts in which this work was heard. The suburb of Hietzing, near Schönbrunn, was under the then parish administration of Klosterneuburg and provided two places for the Strauss orchestra:

            1. The inn opposite the Kaiserstöckl, which in 1823 was taken over by Ferdinand Donmayer and quickly attracted a large number of visitors. The newly built ball-room of the casino was first opened, however, on 16th June 1833, with a Strauss concert.

            2. The old Vienna room at The White Angel opposite the Platzl parish church. It is not known in which of these Johann Strauss could have appeared at reunions in the summer of 1829.

 

Somewhat simpler is the interpretation of the Weissgarb Parish Fair. The suburb of Weissgarb was built on the west bank of an arm of the Danube, now known as the Danube canal. Today Weissgärber Street and Weissgärber Lände in the Landsträsse district into which Weissgarb was incorporated are reminders of the once quickly growing settlement. In The Good Shepherd there were reunions and balls until well into the nineteenth century. The old Weissgarb parish church was dedicated to St Margaret, whose feast-day was celebrated on 20th July. In this month in 1829 the Parish Fair Dances by Johann Strauss must have been performed for the first time.

 

The waltz is scored for one flute, one oboe, two clarinets, two horns, two trumpets, one trombone, percussion and strings. Strauss had enlarged his orchestra. The structure of the work is simple. It consists of an introduction of four bars, five waltz sections with general Ländler-style motifs and a comprehensive coda. The waltz offers a further step in the development of the definitive form of the Viennese waltz.

 

[6] Wilhelm-Tell-Galoppe, Op. 29[b] (William Tell Galop)

 

The four-act opera Guillaume Tell by Gioachino Rossini was first performed at the Paris Grand Opéra on 3rd August 1829. It did not take long for reports of its success to reach all the major cities of Europe, but it was not until 7th March 1830 that the Overture to William Tell was heard in Vienna in a concert by the Vienna Philharmonic Society. Johann Strauss reacted quickly. His publisher Tobias Haslinger was able to issue his Tell Galop on 20th November 1829 as No.29 in his collection Favourite Galops.

 

With unerring instinct Johann Strauss chose the most effective motifs from the Tell Overture for his rapid galop, only in the closing section of the through-composed work presenting his own ideas, which nevertheless were as skilful and effective as were the 21 bars by Rossini. In his later Sperl Galop, Op.42, he repeated the procedure once more, in this work linking Rossini’s music with original melodies.

 

Success was not wanting in either case. The Tell Galop was first performed in Vienna at the latest in autumn 1829 and was heard for a long time in ball-rooms.

 

[7] Frohsinn im Gebirge. Walzer, Op. 26 (Cheerfulness in the Mountains, Waltz)

 

The waltz Cheerfulness in the Mountains, which appeared from Tobias Haslinger on 11th September 1829, like the Krapfenwaldel Waltz, Op.12, referred to the inn on the way from Sievering to Kobenzl and Kahlenberg, as the title-page of the piano edition indicates. It shows a dance scene in the open air, accompanied by a small group of musicians, and in the background the twin peaks of the Kahlenberg and Leopoldsberg. In the Krapfenwaldel too Johann Strauss was to find ‘cheerfulness in the mountains’. He must often have played there for dances with his musicians.

            After a strong chord some introductory bars lead to the six-part waltz, which, like the pleasing coda is in Ländler style. What must he once have played on the border of the Vienna Woods?! The critic Ludwig Speidel, the most important expert after Eduard Hanslick among Vienna journalists, suggested that motifs from Minuets in Haydn symphonies are reflected in various melodies by the older Johann Strauss, and consequently named Haydn as the ‘grandfather of the Viennese waltz’. One can certainly look at this differently, but it cannot be denied that in Viennese music all elements later developed are to be found in the works of Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and often also in Schubert.

 

[8] Einzugs-Galopp, Op. 35 (Entrance Galop)

 

In his Favourite Galops Tobias Haslinger, on 18th September 1830, included the Entrance Galop of Johann Strauss as No.31. A week-end in early autumn brought an important event for contemporary life in Vienna, the opening of the luxurious Tivoli establishment on the Grünenberg in Obermeidling No.12. The most important attraction was the installation of a downward run for carriages on the side of the hill, which was of no great height. Since the carriages attained a reasonably high speed on the way down, they always offered an occasion for moderate excitement.

 

Clearly the carriages were not the only attractions of Tivoli. The Strauss orchestra played for the opening Sunday and Thursday of the establishment, alternating with the band of No.60 Infantry Regiment under the direction of the popular bandmaster Joseph Resniczek (1787-1848), for dancing and for entertainment.

 

On 19th September 1830 there was a great crowd and three thousand entry tickets were sold. Friendly autumn weather allowed the undisturbed continuation of the celebration at the Tivoli. Probably Johann Strauss made use of the opportunity of this crowded occasion to introduce his celebratory Entrance Galop. The work, which was opportunely brought out by Tobias Haslinger, with its fanfare introduction before the galop itself, was ideal for the occasion. It is not hard to imagine the enjoyment of the dancing couples at the rapidity of the four eight-bar galop sections. After the short but celebratory coda they were probably exhausted and could refresh themselves with the rich choice of food and drink that Tivoli offered.

 

[9] Sperls Fest-Walzer, Op. 30 (Sperl Festival Waltz)

 

The Sperl in Leopoldstadt, which was originally a modest inn, called after a huntsman, Sperlbauer, was extended from 1807 by its new owner, Johann Georg Scherzer, and in the course of time developed into a leading centre of gastronomy and social activity in Vienna. The festivals at the Sperl became a legend, known and admired throughout the monarchy and abroad. Scherzer always tried to engage the best dance-musicians of the time for his balls and entertainments. In the years after the Congress of Vienna, Michael Pamer played there and in 1828 Joseph Lanner. On 4th October 1829 Johann Strauss made his entry with his musicians, continuing there, with a short interruption, until his death. His sons Johann and Joseph also played for dances in an establishment that was further enlarged and modernised. After the departure of the Strauss orchestra the undertaking gradually declined and was closed. In its place today stands a school in Little Sperl Street.

 

In the Sperl Johann Strauss found working conditions that were ideal for him. The good standing of the place promoted his own reputation, but it was not long before his ability and appeal drew a public from all levels of society, bringing further fame to the establishment. Finally both achieved world fame, the Sperl and Johann Strauss. At his first appearance there, in his home district of Leopoldstadt, with his Sperl Festival Waltz Strauss had very successfully introduced himself as music director and composer. His orchestra now consisted of one flute, one oboe, two clarinets, one bassoon, two horns, two trumpets, one trombone, percussion and strings and could perform successfully and without difficulty in the big room on the first floor of the establishment and at well attended balls. With Johann Georg Scherzer and his publisher Tobias Haslinger, Strauss developed a successful reputation, from which all profited. The Sperl Festival Waltz stands at the beginning of this collaboration. It was a work without an introduction, in six parts and with a very comprehensive coda. The kind of melodic structure, particularly in Waltz 4b, points to the future, but also shows that Strauss developed a tradition that stemmed from the era of Haydn and Mozart. The refined motif of the first waltz is also on the title-page of the piano edition as a motto. It marks the beginning of a splendid period in the life of Vienna.

 

The piano edition of the waltz, with the Opus number 30, was announced on 21st December 1829.

 

[10], [11] & [12] Ungarische Galoppe oder Frischka, Op. 36 (Hungarian Galops or Friss)

 

The Hungarian Galops also appeared in the collection Favourite Galops for the Pianoforte in three volumes and was announced by Tobias Haslinger on 12th September 1831 (the first group). The second group of Hungarian Galops was published on 11th November 1831 and the third on 17th December. The inside title of the edition of the first group and the announcement by Haslinger include the phrase ‘performed by Johann Strauss’.

 

The title suggests that in these pieces there is a prior example for the Hungarian Dances of Johannes Brahms, issued in 1869 by the Berlin publisher Simrock. These pieces were for piano duet and became very popular, surprising music-lovers with motifs and melodies that Brahms had learnt in Hungary, when he appeared as a virtuoso pianist in Pest. In these dances Brahms intended ‘to offer art music in the spirit of Hungarian melodies, but in no way a copy of Magyar folk-music’.*

 

Now Johann Strauss certainly had no intention of writing art music, but effective, passionately felt dance music. Although in 1831 he still had never been to Hungary, he found in Vienna sufficient opportunity to hear characteristic Hungarian folk-style music, not folk-music which was then generally unknown, as was often played in Vienna (the Hungarian Becs) by gypsy ensembles. His son Johann in the collected edition of his father’s work in 1887 nevertheless gave the Hungarian Galops or Frischka as compositions by Johann Strauss.

 

The first part offers four eight-bar melodies, without introduction and coda, the second has a four-bar introduction, followed by four galops without a coda, the third consists of six eight-bar motifs and a short coda. ‘Six eight-bar [phrases] are varied to offer a whole repertoire of Magyar figuration’. **

Altogether the three parts, as Op.36, provide a spirited, fascinating composition, with a vitality exciting both to dancers and to audiences.

 

The first part of the Hungarian Galops or Frischka was performed at the Sperl on 24th August 1831 at a benefit event for Johann Strauss. The second part followed at a ball at the Sperl on 9th October 1831. The third was on the programme at the Sperl for the first time for the Catherine Ball on 22nd November.

 

* Karl Geiringer: Johannes Brahms, sein Leben und Schaffen, Bärenreiter, 1955

 ** Max Schönherr: Johann Strauss-Vater, Universal, 1954

 

[13] Des Verfassers beste Laune. Charmant-Walzer, Op. 31 (The Composer’s Best Fancy. Charming Waltz)

 

When Tobias Haslinger offered his customers the waltz The Composer’s Best Fancy by Johann Strauss on 26th November 1829, the 25-year-old composer had become so popular that his ‘portrait to the life’ could be represented on the title-page of the piano edition. Now it was generally known, where Haslinger and his business partner offered their editions in a number of European centres, what Strauss looked like, whose reputation was so high wherever Viennese music was spoken of. Haslinger supplied the title of the work with the additional words Charmant-Walzer, whatever that may mean.

 

Haslinger’s edition followed only one day after the first performance of the composition at the traditional popular Catherine Ball on 25th November 1829 at the Sperl as a benefit performance for Johann Strauss. That meant that certainly high net proceeds of the ball came to the music director, who then had responsibility for his wife Anna and his three children, Johann, Joseph and Anna. Strauss was generous and allowed the ladies at the ball to have a copy of the piano edition of the waltz.

 

That the composer had chosen the title The Composer’s Best Fancy for this work, was easy to understand. With his entry into what was then Vienna’s leading establishment, in which regular balls and reunions were held, Strauss had taken an important step on his road to fame, prestige and prosperity. The quality of his fancy was, then, self-evident, but the musical substance of the new work was of value too. A short introduction of chords, one to each of four bars, was followed by six real Straussian waltzes and a comprehensive, carefully worked and structured coda. Music-lovers were charmed by the work, as were later generations. The esteemed public prosecutor and music historian August Wilhelm Ambros (1816-1876) judged that the waltz belonged to the best works of Johann Strauss. Carl Czerny published his Charmant-Variationen, Op.249, as a tribute to the work. Johann Strauss had advanced still further on the path to fame.

 

[14] Sperl-Galopp, Op. 42 (Sperl Galop)

 

Operatic music in dance-halls was a matter of course in the Biedermeier decades after the Congress of Vienna of 1814-15. If a stage work had success in the theatre, its melodies were immediately played in the concerts of the Lanner and Strauss ensembles and in concerts by military bands. The enthusiasm of the Viennese public for Gioachino Rossini and many of his operas is echoed strongly in dance music. The older Johann Strauss, after the triumph of William Tell, first performed in Paris on 3rd August 1829 and, after considerable hesitation by the board of censors over the plot that was not friendly to Austria, first given in Vienna in 1830, was inspired to write a number of compositions. Even before the Court Opera first brought to the public the opera William Tell at the Kärntnerthor Theatre, Strauss had played in his concerts and for his balls the effective Tell Galop, which appeared in November 1829 as Opus 29. When Strauss in the autumn of 1829 moved up to the then most famous establishment in Vienna, the Sperl, in Leopoldstadt, he remembered again Rossini’s music for William Tell. The four bars of introduction and the first sixteen bars of the galop are quotations from the Soldiers’ Dance from William Tell, followed by eleven bars in the style of Rossini and then three sections of the best, most cheerful Strauss. Rossini and Strauss, that was a guarantee of success, but the Sperl Galop is also evidence that Strauss could hold his own with the famous Italian composer.

 

[15] Contredanses par Jean Strauss, Œuvre 44

 

Tobias Haslinger announced the Contredanses in the Wiener Zeitung on 20th April 1831, giving the title and the name of the composer in French. Here for the first time Johann Strauss made use of the form of the French quadrille and the six parts have the indications Pantalon - Eté (Summer) - La Poule (The Hen) - Trénis - Pastourelle and Finale. Joseph Lanner followed him in 1833 with his Quadrille française, Op.68.

 

Strauss took the motifs of his Contredanses from actual operas then popular with the Viennese public. This time too Rossini’s music is there and for the first time Strauss used melodies from the comic opera Fra Diavolo by Daniel-François-Esprit Auber, which was first performed at the Paris Opéra-Comique on 28th January 1830 and first staged at the Kärntnertor Theatre in Vienna by the Court Opera on 18th September 1830.

 

Johann Strauss did not first write French quadrilles after his concerts in October 1839 in Paris and his meeting with the conductor Philippe Musard (1793-1859), since he was greatly influenced by the French composer of Paris quadrilles, largely on opera melodies, and inspired to write his own masterly figure-dances from his Opus 124, the Vienna Carnival Quadrille, which, nevertheless, uses original motifs.

 

Franz Mailer

English version by Keith Anderson