In 1888, the 24-year-old (but already quite successful) Richard Strauss was conducting a production of Mozart’s Don Giovanni in Munich. Over the course of rehearsals, he became quite taken by the opera’s female lead, Pauline de Ahna, whom he eventually married. Perhaps inspired by the opera and by his own amorous longing, he began work on his own version of the Don Juan legend, based on Nikolaus Lenau’s unfinished play, Don Juans Ende. 

The resulting work is one of the composer’s first forays into the Symphonic Poem, a musical form in which a specific narrative arc is depicted with no adherence to standard musical structures. Strauss would spend the rest of his career expanding on and perfecting the form, eschewing the traditional symphony and ultimately composing ten such poems in total.

In Don Juan, Strauss gets straight to the point, opening with a flurry of notes as the Don bursts onto the scene. After prancing floridly around the orchestra, he comes upon a beautiful woman with whom he is immediately taken, and Strauss introduces the first of several iterations of his love theme. First sounded by the violin, clarinet, and horn together, the melody begins with an ascending major 6th, an interval that has since been used by many composers to depict budding love. To hear an ascending major sixth, simply hum the first two notes of My bonnie Lies Over the Ocean. After the rising interval, Strauss pauses briefly—a small catch of the breath as the couple meets. Perhaps in a nod to Strauss, John Williams begins his iconic Han Solo and the Princess theme with the exact same figure.

As the story progresses, Strauss winds his themes together, the music becoming increasingly more passionate. But the climate is unexpectedly dark, perhaps hinting at Don Juan’s fate, or suggesting that his continued pursuit of pleasure is ultimately fleeting and unfulfilling.

Nevertheless, he presses on and soon encounters his next romantic entanglement, played tenderly by the solo oboe. Though Strauss never offered explicit narration, many believe that this iteration may be Donna Anna, the only woman with whom, in many versions of the legend, Don Juan had a true emotional connection. But the Don ultimately balks at their connection, interrupting the detente with an even more insistent hero theme played by four horns in unison.

The music then begins to spin out of control as Don Juan’s exploits get out of hand. People are starting to catch on to him, and he must continually elude angry fathers and husbands. The English horn reiterates the main love theme, but this time in a haunting minor. Perhaps his escapades have lost their delight?

Eventually, Don Juan tires of his endless cycle of seduction and allows himself to be bested in a duel by the father of one of his lovers. Unlike Mozart’s version of the story, Strauss forgoes the famous Last Supper scene in which the avenging ghost of the Commendatore drags him to hell. Instead, Strauss allows Don Juan to die a relatively peaceful death as trembling strings fade into two final, eerie chords.

Like many of Strauss’s scores, Don Juan is devilishly challenging for the orchestra. Famously, after a rehearsal for the premiere, one of the horn players cried, “Dear God! What sin have we committed for You to send us this rod for our backs!” Today, the work is a favorite for orchestral auditions, and just about every musician on stage will have played some passage from it as part of their audition for the ASO.