DON QUIJOTE Op. 35

Symphonic Poem

By Richard Strauss

A Reception History

By Germán Marcano

The performance of Strauss Tone Poem on Friday

afternoon and last night by the Chicago Orchestra

must have aroused a good deal of discussion among

musicians. It is easy enough to decry certain tendencies

as being outside the sphere of real music; but when one

is confronted with a work which appeals so directly to the

imagination as “Don Quijote” that it would be foolish to

deny its artistic merits, what is to become of theory?, The

“Don Quijote is certainly a work of art, but to what department

of art does it belong, if not music?

…But such tone-poem as…the Don Quijote of Richard Strauss

would be condemned …because (it) undoubtedly contain

pasajes que son distintivamente feos como música, pero

tienen su valor como imitaciones."

La Tribuna de Chicago, 8 de enero de 1899

“Es difícil garantizar los postulados del compositor, y se necesitará mucho

reajuste de ideas antes que el “Don Quijote",

with all its beauties, can be listened as anything other than

a tour de force. Nor will the question fall to present itself

as to how far the composer means to be taken seriously in

it; how far he is bent on carrying out the mystification

suggested in his pedantic title with its conventional Italian

description: how far he means to push the “Fantastical” of which he gives warning in it.”

The New York Times, February 19.1904

Inspirado en la famosa novela española de 1605 de Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1547-1616), el Poema Sinfónico Don Quijote Op. 35 es la sexta de una serie de diez obras maestras programáticas escritas por Richard Strauss (1864-1949) entre 1886 y 1915. Compuesto en 1897 y por primera vez ejecutado en 1898, Don Quijote destaca como su ejemplo más fino de pintura musical, y, como el director Norman Del Mar sostiene “.…un firme hito en la música orquestal de la Escuela Post-romántica"[1]. Sin embargo, esta obra no ha logrado llegar tan fácilmente a las salas de concierto como otros poemas sinfónicos del mismo compositor. Mientras composiciones como Don Juan, Also Spracht Zarathustra (Así habló Zaratustra) y Ein Heldenleben have always enjoyed popularity among listeners and musicians, Don Quijote Don Quijote has for some reason invited criticism since the time of its composition. Many of the reasons for this unjustifiable attitude can be associated with the impracticality of performance, general repudiation to certain effects and, on the whole, a lack of knowledge of what the work is really about.

There is nothing new about setting the adventures of the ingenuous knight to music. Composers like Telemann, Purcell, Rubinstein and Massenet had written suites and operas on the subject. These earlier attempts, however, did not influence Strauss approach in depicting the adventures of the famous knight and his squire (he hardly knew any of them), since he devised a method of musical representation using thematic transformation. The work is presented in three sections: an introduction that depicts the gradual deterioration of Don Quijote’s mental health, a group of ten variations corresponding to ten episodes in the novel, and the Epilog which describes Don Quijote’s return to sanity and eventual death.

The name Fantastic Variations on a Theme of Knightly Character, as the author titled it, is somehow misleading since it associates this composition with classical variation technique and not with thematic transformation. Even today performances of Don Quijote Don Quijote raise questions among listeners, who come out of the concerts having enjoyed the Epilog, but wonder what the rest of the piece is about. The general reaction at the time of its first performance[2] was similar:

“…The work…aroused the greatest interest in all at the same time” 

                               musicians, without always gaining their sympathy 

Musikalishes Wochenblatt (issue no.12, 1898)

In March 18, ten days after its premiere, Strauss conducted the work in Frankfurt with similar results:

“…R. Strauss new symphonic poem Don Quijote 

                                        aroused the most interest in Frankfurt…and was

                                       warmly applauded, even though there was some 

                                       dissent”

Musikalishes Wochenblatt (issue no.13, 1898)

If the daring design of the work provoke reactions against it, the various effects that Strauss used to depict some of the adventures of the hero have been controversial from its composition to the present day. One of the most talked about episodes of the work is Variation II, which describes onomatopoeically the bleating of the sheep which Don Quijote attacked, taking them for the mighty army of Alifanfaron and Pentapolin, King of the Garamantas (measure 234-40). In these measures the work, basically tonally-orientated, takes a turn into a completely atonal and almost aleatoric style which, if best to describe the events of the story, could not be accepted by the 1898 audiences, who aroused noisy protests. The review of the first American performance in 1899[3]1899 referred quite rudely about this particular passage:

“…if the truth must be told one is inclined to be a little sorry    

                        that Richard Strauss did not omit those grossly realistic touches 

                        in “Don Quijote” which must certainly mar the work for a great

                        many listeners. …why not bring a real sheep into the orchestra

                        andt train them to bleat at a given signal. 

La Tribuna de Chicago, 8 de enero de 1899

When the work was performed in Paris in 1900 conducted by Strauss, his friend Romain Rolland recalled that the French also reacted strongly against this episode:[4]:

“…Indignation from one section of the public. The

                                      good old French public…does not tolerate a joke, thinks 

                                     it is being laughed at, the people are disrespectful to it. The baaing of the sheep infuriates it.” 

Diary, 11 March 1900

For many years this passage has been the center of discussion among critics and historians, whose arguments fail to understand the programmatic nature of the work and ignore other wonderful depictions in it, like Quijote’s gradual mental disintegration and his sublime submission to death. It is, however, interesting that whereas L’apres midi d’un faune (1897) is considered the pioneer composition of the music of the 20th century, the bleating of the sheep from Strauss Don QuijoteDon Quijote, more advanced than anything composed at the time, is hardly mentioned in historical treatises.

More than conductors and audiences, it has been the solo cellists who have contributed mainly to the establishment of Don Quijote Strauss’s Don Quijote as one of the major orchestral scores of the 19th century. The role of Don Quijote, assigned by Strauss to a solo cello, has been performed by all the major cello soloists of the 20th century, some of them identified so much with the knight as to be nicknamed after him . This has changed the original conception of the work, which has been transformed from a Symphonic poem into a Cello Concerto.

By looking at the score one can presume that Strauss intended the solo part for the leader of the orchestral cello section, with careful indications given to the inside player. Modern performances of the work, however, tend to adopt the usual concerto sitting, where the soloist sits in front of the orchestra, omitting the numerous and complex “tutti” sections. Although this seating provides a visually attractive solo element to the work, the original intention is again misinterpreted. The seating gets in the way of the elaborate scoring for groups of cellos, and especially of the partnership of the cello and the viola solo, instrument that takes the role of Sancho Panza .[5]In spite of this, the work has already acquired this tradition of performance in concerto setting, and was even adopted by the composer himself in later years.

This conception of the work as a cello concerto creates the impracticality of having to find a soloist to perform the role of Don QuijoteDon Quijote, a well known player that makes up for the little popularity of the piece. In view of the problem, most orchestras prefer to program more popular concertos, so the double function of good soloist-popular composition could be filled.

Apart from the impracticality mentioned, Strauss’s Don Quijote Don Quijote calls for some unusual features in its orchestration: a tenor tuba, two additional horns and, for the first time in Western Orchestral music, a Wind Machine. This apparatus is introduced in Variation VII (measures 515-25) added to rapid chromatic scales in the winds, to illustrate the flying ride of Don Quijote and Sancho Panza .[6]Although the use of this device has a specific programmatic function in the work (he also used it in the Sinfonia Alpina, 1915), this pioneering thought had some repercussions in the work of later composers like Ravel(Dapnis et Chloe, 1912),Schoenberg (Jacobleister, 1922), Milhaud and Vaughan Williams.

This colorful and exuberant orchestration of Don Quijote was perhaps the aspect that attracted the most the attention of the older generation of composers in the late 19th century. His skills as a brilliant orchestrator were recognized by celebrated composers and critics from the times of Don Juan Don Juan (1888), even though many of them did not sympathize with his musical ideas:

                                     “Color is everything, musical thoughts nothing” 

                                      “…a brilliant virtuoso of the orchestra, lacking only musical ideas” [7]                

Edward Hanslick 1892[8]

Strauss’s daring orchestration in Don Quijote was Don Quijote , however, highly criticized by some of his elder contemporaries:

                                           “I saw the score of Don Quijote. What a shameless  

                                            this Richard Strauss is!” 

Rimski Korsakov[9]

Others, on the contrary, applauded his inventiveness and called it “Orchestral thinking” :[10]:

“A wind Machine?, Why not? The only thing that 

                                            matters is whether the composer…achieves the

Antonin Dvorak[11]

By 1904 Don Quijote Don Quijote had been performed in most of the important musical capitals of Europe and the USA. During this highly revolutionary time in the history of music the work attracted the attention of contemporary composers with fresher ideas who could tolerate and understand the daring thoughts of this controversial composer. The German composer Max Reger (1873-1916) was fascinated with its inventiveness when he studied the score in 1902:

                              “I recently very eagerly studied Richard Strauss

                               Don Quijote;it is fabulous what the man writes.  

                               I am just so happy and excited that we have him” 

Letter to Arthur Seidl, Dec 29th, 1902[12]

Another composer highly impressed with Strauss’s Don Quijote was Ferrucio Busoni (1866-1924), who heard the work on two occasions, its second New York performance in 1904 (under Strauss), and a later Boston performance in 1911. According to Busoni the New York performance of the work, with Casals on the cello, was not very successful: badly attended and poorly performed, having to start it twice. After the Boston performance, however, his admiration for the master was expressed in a letter to his wife:

                                 “It is a work of great quality, ordinarily in the 

                                    lyrical spots, extraordinarily exciting in the 

                                    grotesque parts,…one of the most interesting 

                                   and creative things of our time and may be the

                                   best from this composer”[13]  

In spite of the great impressions that Strauss Don Quijote left in these younger contemporaries and other important figures, this work can not really be considered an influential force in the music to come. Strauss was the last 19th century Romantic composer, living in a time when the elements and aesthetics of music composition were changing radically. As the breakdown of tonality was already imminent, Strauss music experimented further in tonality without abandoning the melodious style of his Romantic German predecessors. The Symphonic poem, which was at its highest point at the time of Don Juan, Don Juanlost the battle with the “Absolute Music” critics, practically disappearing after 1915, leaving Strauss as the last Master of the genre. The ten Tone Poems of Richard Strauss represent an artistic culmination of a genre that was only to have a relatively small influence in the music of the 20th century.

Although today audiences (and even musicians) still react to Don Quijote Don Quijote Quijote in the same way as the public of 1898, the work has a definite place in the repertoire of every major orchestra, conductor and cellist. It is indisputably the composer’s finest example of musical painting, his most daring in design and most controversial in effects. It is in fact because of this daringness and controversy that the character of Cervantes’s Don Quijote comes to life, a man who in the realms of reality searches for love and justice. This character reflects in a way Strauss own life as a composer, immersed in his own musical world searching for the highest artistic goals.

BIBLIOGRAPHY CONSULTED

Norman del Mar: Richard Strauss: A critical commentary on his life and works.Cornell University Press. 1986.

Eduard Hanslick: Vienna Golden years of Music 1850-1900.New York: Simon and Schuster.1950

The New Grove Dictionary of Music andMusiciansEdited by Stanley Sadie. London MacMillan Publishers.1980

Notes on the recording Classics AB-67023, ABC Records, By Donald Johns.

Mueller von Asow: Richard Strauss. Thematishes VerzeichnisVerlag L. Doblinger. Wien-Wisbaden. 1955

Richard Strauss and Romaine Rolland. Correspondance.University of California Press. Berkley. LA. 1968

Ernst Krause: Richard Strauss. The Man and his Works.Collet’s LTD. London. 1964.

Chicago Tribune. January 8th, 1899

New York Times. February 14th, 19th and March 4th, 1904

[1] Norman del Mar: Ricardo Strauss: A critical commentary on his life and works.. Prensa de la Universidad de Cornell, 1986. Pág. 163.

[2] Strauss se encontraba en España para el momento de la primera presentación (8 de marzo de 1898). Ésta fue conducida por Franz Wullner con Friederick Grutzmacher como el solista al chelo.

[3] La primera ejecución norteamericana tuvo lugar en Chicago el 6 de enero de 1989, con la Orquesta Sinfónica de Chicago bajo la dirección de Theodore Thomas, a menos de un año de la première alemana.

[4] Correspondencia entre R. Rolland (1863-1941) y el francés Paul Tortelier (1914-90).

[5] Este rol no solamente es tomado por el solo de la viola, sino que en algunos episodios también es adoptado por la tuba tenor y el clarinete bajo.

[6] El Re grave en los bajos y tímpani describe, en realidad, que nunca levantaron vuelo (Capítulo XLI).

⁷ Esto lo declara Hanslick después de oír Todd und Verklärung en 1893.

⁸ Edward Hanslick: Vienna Golden years of Music 1850-1900.. Nueva York, Simon & Schuster 1950.

⁹ Carta de Rimsky a Taneyev. De los comentarios sobre grabación Classics AB-67023, ABC Records, por Donald Johns.

¹⁰ Después de escuchar Don Quijote, Dvorak describió con este término los requerimientos de cualquier composición orquestal. Ernst Krause: Ricardo Strauss. El hombre y su obra. Collet’s Ltd. Londres, 1964; Pág. 170.

¹¹ Ernst Krause: Ricardo Strauss. El hombre y su obra. Collet’s Ltd. Londres, 1964; Pág. 223.

[12] Mueller von Asow: Richard Strauss. Thematishes Verzeichnis. Editora L. Doblinger. Viena-Wisbaden, 1955. Originalmente en Alemán. Pág. 220.

[13] Mueller von Asow: Richard Strauss. Thematishes Verzeichnis. Editora L. Doblinger. Viena-Wisbaden, 1955. Originalmente en Alemán. Pág. 221.