Strauss was the son of Franz Joseph Strauss, the principal hornist in the Munich Court Orchestra. Strauss was born in 1864 in Munich. Strauss exhibited talent for music at a very young age. He had extensive training in harmony, theory, piano, violin and orchestration. This exercise helped Strauss to bring out music with incredible touch and maturity just before he became an adult. Even the age of atom bombs, television, and jet engines did not deter Richard Strauss from sticking to his fundamental romantic aesthetic. Strauss had to cross one of the most turbulent periods in the cultural, social and political history of the world.
His father was a musical conservative. He along with Ludwig Thuille who was their family friend and a Munich School composer were Strauss’ music teachers initially. Strauss wrote Serenade for 13 winds, Op 7 in 1881 when he was 17. Hans von Bulow the conductor then declared that Strauss was “by far the most striking personality since Brahms”. Bulow gave Strauss his first commission and an assistant conductor position. Strauss learned to develop a high regard for the writings of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche and the music of Wagner and Liszt with the help of new friends. As he launched a long career of conducting and composing,... show more

Strauss was the son of Franz Joseph Strauss, the principal hornist in the Munich Court Orchestra. Strauss was born in 1864 in Munich. Strauss exhibited talent for music at a very young age. He had extensive training in harmony, theory, piano, violin and orchestration. This exercise helped Strauss to bring out music with incredible touch and maturity just before he became an adult. Even the age of atom bombs, television, and jet engines did not deter Richard Strauss from sticking to his fundamental romantic aesthetic. Strauss had to cross one of the most turbulent periods in the cultural, social and political history of the world.
His father was a musical conservative. He along with Ludwig Thuille who was their family friend and a Munich School composer were Strauss’ music teachers initially. Strauss wrote Serenade for 13 winds, Op 7 in 1881 when he was 17. Hans von Bulow the conductor then declared that Strauss was “by far the most striking personality since Brahms”. Bulow gave Strauss his first commission and an assistant conductor position. Strauss learned to develop a high regard for the writings of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche and the music of Wagner and Liszt with the help of new friends. As he launched a long career of conducting and composing, it took him all over Europe and the U.S.
It was apparent that the orchestra was the natural medium right from the beginning of Strauss’ career as a composer. Strauss launched a series of works in 1886 with the composition of the “Symphonic fantasy” Aus Italien which represents both one of the crucial stages of his career and a body of music of vital importance in the late German Romantic repertoire. He brought the tone poem per se, to its acme though he did not invent it. Strauss exhibited his unlimited gift for harnessing the coloristic scopes of the orchestra as a remarkable tool which only a few composers ever had, in works like Don Juan (1888-1898) and also sprach Zarathustra (1895-1896) whose first minute or so used in the film 2001:A Space Odyssey.
Strauss’ interest turned more fully to opera after becoming conductor at Berlin’s Hofoper. This with the dawn of the twentieth century brought out a body of unforgettable works from Stauss which have long been fixtures of the repertoire: Salome (1903-1905), Elektra (1906-1908), and Der Rosenkavalier (1909-1910). These are just a few of his best-known trials on the stage. Strauss became co-director of the Vienna Staatsoper in 1919. But he was compelled to resign by his partner Franz Schalk five years later. The partner protested because he had to attend too many of the operational duties while Strauss was often away guest conducting or being felicitated as a great composer. Strauss finally distanced both the Nazis and their opponents. When the political climate in Europe deteriorated in 1930 deep political inexperience led to the composer’s perplexed association with Nazi propaganda apparatus.
Strauss was permitted to continue his profession when the World War II concluded. But it was to become just a shadow of his past fame. Serious health problems started afflicting him. His financial status had nosedived. The monuments of Goethe’s Weimar house, the Dresden, Munich, and Vienna opera houses which were embodiment of great German art for him had been destroyed. During his final years, his works like Oboe Concerto in 1945 and the stunningly meaningful Four Last Songs in 1948 confirm Straus
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