Concert Band - Level 5 - Digital Download

SKU: A0.1472273

Composed by Richard Strauss. Arranged by Steven Nunes. Opera,Romantic Period. 391 pages. Nagamon Publications #1049975. Published by Nagamon Publications (A0.1472273).

Richard Georg Strauss (11 June 1864 – 8 September 1949) was a German composer and conductor best known for his tone poems and operas. Considered a leading composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras, he has been described as a successor of Richard Wagner and Franz Liszt. Along with Gustav Mahler, he represents the late flowering of German Romanticism, in which pioneering subtleties of orchestration are combined with an advanced harmonic style.

Der Rosenkavalier (The Knight of the Rose or The Rose-Bearer), Op. 59, is a comic opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to an original German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. It is loosely adapted from Louvet de Couvrai's novel Les amours du chevalier de Faublas and Molière's comedy Monsieur de Pourceaugnac.

In 1945 Strauss allowed an orchestral Rosenkavalier Suite to be published, but apparently was not involved in creating it.  It is likely that conductor Artur Rodzi?ski arranged it, as he conducted the suite's first performance, in October 1944 by the New York Philharmonic.

The suite begins with the opera's orchestral prelude, depicting the Marschallin's and Octavian's night of passion (vividly portrayed by whooping horns and saxophones). Next comes the appearance of Octavian as the Rosenkavalier, depicted in tender music; the sight of him looking so young makes the Marschallin realise that he will soon leave her for a younger woman. There follows the duet between Octavian and Sophie – in which their love for each other becomes ever more obvious, but this is abruptly interrupted by the discordant music associated with Ochs's clumsy arrival. Next the violins tentatively introduce the first waltz, followed by another given out by the solo violin, before the whole orchestra settles into waltz mode. A general pause and a violin solo leads into the nostalgic music where the Marschallin sadly realises she has lost Octavian. Then comes its ecstatic climax. The work closes with a singularly robust waltz, depicting Ochs at his most pompous, and a boisterous coda newly composed for the suite.

The PDF contains the Full Score and a full set of parts.