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Sextet for Strings from Capriccio, Op. 85
Richard Strauss

- Born June 11, 1864, in Munich
- Died September 8, 1949, in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany
- Composed in 1940–41, arranged in 1943
- Duration: 11 minutes

In 1942, Richard Strauss premiered what would be his final complete opera, Capriccio. It was a genre that occupied his time for 50 years, resulting in 16 operas, several of which have become mainstays in the repertoire. With Capriccio, Strauss assumed a posture of reflection, signaled immediately by its subtitle, “Conversation piece for music.” Rather than featuring a dramatic or psychological matter at its heart, the opera follows its the main characters as they mull and argue over a single question: which is more important in art—music or words? The plot was suggested to by the Austrian author Stefan Zweig, who was Strauss’s librettist for the 1935 opera The Silent Woman. Zweig had come across the libretto for an opera by Antonio Salieri called First the Music and Then the Words, which depicts the writing of a new opera and the arguments between the composer and the poet about the merits of their disciplines, how they fit together, and which is most important. In Strauss’s version, the poet Olivier and composer Flamand are vying for the love of Countess Madeleine, putting increasing pressure on her to choose between them as they collaborate on an opera with a story based on their own conundrum and challenge the Countess to decide how it will end. However, the Countess realizes that the ideal is someone who offers both, just as opera, itself, is the great union of music and words. Not wanting to choose between them, she ultimately surrenders to the fact she cannot. “A hopeless task, keeping them apart,” the countess announces, reflecting that when words and music are fused together they become something entirely new. 

Opening the opera is a sextet of two violins, two violas, and two cellos—a departure from the expected full orchestral introduction. This is because the music is serving two purposes: it is what both the audience in the hall and the characters on stage are hearing. It is the sextet Flamand has written for the Countess being rehearsed as he and Olivier listen and begin their argument about the supremacy of music or text. Presented as a stand-alone piece even during Strauss’s lifetime, the sextet is written in a traditional sonata-form structure; its opening thematic material is developed and later returns in a recapitulation. Tonally, it stays mostly in some version of the key of F, exploring both the major and minor modes, traveling only briefly into other keys. With the opening of the development section the work erupts with passionate trembling, but overall relies more heavily on numerous small adjustments and added accidentals to imbue its melodic unfurling with a sense of profound longing. In the opera, as the last notes of the sextet fade, the theater director who had been asleep wakes up, and the action begins. 

Sextet for Strings from Capriccio, Op. 85
Richard Strauss

- Born June 11, 1864, in Munich
- Died September 8, 1949, in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany
- Composed in 1940–41, arranged in 1943
- Duration: 11 minutes

In 1942, Richard Strauss premiered what would be his final complete opera, Capriccio. It was a genre that occupied his time for 50 years, resulting in 16 operas, several of which have become mainstays in the repertoire. With Capriccio, Strauss assumed a posture of reflection, signaled immediately by its subtitle, “Conversation piece for music.” Rather than featuring a dramatic or psychological matter at its heart, the opera follows its the main characters as they mull and argue over a single question: which is more important in art—music or words? The plot was suggested to by the Austrian author Stefan Zweig, who was Strauss’s librettist for the 1935 opera The Silent Woman. Zweig had come across the libretto for an opera by Antonio Salieri called First the Music and Then the Words, which depicts the writing of a new opera and the arguments between the composer and the poet about the merits of their disciplines, how they fit together, and which is most important. In Strauss’s version, the poet Olivier and composer Flamand are vying for the love of Countess Madeleine, putting increasing pressure on her to choose between them as they collaborate on an opera with a story based on their own conundrum and challenge the Countess to decide how it will end. However, the Countess realizes that the ideal is someone who offers both, just as opera, itself, is the great union of music and words. Not wanting to choose between them, she ultimately surrenders to the fact she cannot. “A hopeless task, keeping them apart,” the countess announces, reflecting that when words and music are fused together they become something entirely new. 

Opening the opera is a sextet of two violins, two violas, and two cellos—a departure from the expected full orchestral introduction. This is because the music is serving two purposes: it is what both the audience in the hall and the characters on stage are hearing. It is the sextet Flamand has written for the Countess being rehearsed as he and Olivier listen and begin their argument about the supremacy of music or text. Presented as a stand-alone piece even during Strauss’s lifetime, the sextet is written in a traditional sonata-form structure; its opening thematic material is developed and later returns in a recapitulation. Tonally, it stays mostly in some version of the key of F, exploring both the major and minor modes, traveling only briefly into other keys. With the opening of the development section the work erupts with passionate trembling, but overall relies more heavily on numerous small adjustments and added accidentals to imbue its melodic unfurling with a sense of profound longing. In the opera, as the last notes of the sextet fade, the theater director who had been asleep wakes up, and the action begins.