If you ever want a theme song about your life, then you’d want to have it written by Richard Strauss.
Courageous, romantic, adventurous, ambitious - no other composer writes about life, in the same way that he does.
His music has resonated with me ever since I was a studying at the University for Music and Performing Arts in Graz, Austria.
As a French Horn player, playing his music is the ultimate test of stamina and endurance, and witnessing Strauss’s Elektra on stage at the Vienna Opera House is something that I’ll never forget.
Richard Strauss’s father, Franz was the principal horn player of the Munich Court Orchestra and an obvious influence in Richard Strauss’s musical life. He wrote two horn concertos, which now sit among the most favoured concertos for horn players.
At the time, Strauss was hoping that his father would premiere his first Horn Concerto, but because of its difficulty and because of the number of high notes(!) it was deemed too much of a risk for his reputation, so the honours went elsewhere.
If there’s one thing I know about playing Strauss - is that you have to absolutely back yourself and just go for it!
His tone poem Ein Heldenleben and his comic opera Der Rosenkavalier would have to be among the most epic pieces for orchestra - there’s everything that you’d ever want in there - from heroic horn lines to luscious strings and everything in between.
That’s why Richard Strauss is my pick for this year’s Classic 100.
Joel Carnegie presents Music In Time on ABC Classic.The Classic 100: Composer countdown takes place on Saturday 8 and Sunday 9 June 2019.
