Johann Strauss I was one of the two waltz kings of Vienna bearing that
name. The more famous one, the composer of “The Blue Danube” was the
son. But the father was also one of Vienna’s most popular composers and
café-house conductors. He was born in Vienna on March 14, 1804, and as a
boy he studied both the violin and harmony. His love for music, combined
with the decision of his parents to make him a bookbinder, led him to
run away from home. When he was fifteen he joined Michael Pamer’s
orchestra which played at the Sperl café; another of its members was
Josef Lanner, soon also to become a major figure in Vienna’s musical
life. As Lanner’s star rose, so did Johann Strauss’. First Strauss
played in the Lanner Quartet at the _Goldenen Rebbuhn_ and other cafés;
after that he was a member of the Lanner Orchestra which appeared in
Vienna’s leading cafés. When Lanner’s mounting success made it necessary
for him to create two orchestras, he selected Johann Strauss to conduct
one of them. Then, in 1826, Johann Strauss formed an orchestra of his
own which made its debut at the Bock Café. For the next two decades he
was the idol of Vienna, Lanner’s only rival. By 1830 he had two hundred
musicians under him. His major successes as a café-house conductor came
at the Sperl and the Redoutensaal. But his fame spread far beyond
Vienna. In 1833 he toured all Austria, and in 1834 he appeared in
Berlin. After that he performed in all the major European capitals,
achieving formidable successes in London and Paris. Meanwhile, in 1833,
he had become bandmaster of the first Vienna militia regiment, one of
the highest honors a performer of light music could achieve in Austria.
In 1845 he was appointed conductor of the Viennese court balls. He died
in Vienna on September 25, 1849.
Like Lanner, Strauss wrote a considerable amount of dance and café-house
music, over 250 compositions. His first composition was the
_Taeuberlwalzer_, named after the café _Zwei Tauben_ where he was then
appearing. After that he wrote waltzes, galops, polkas, quadrilles,
cotillons, contredanses, and marches—which Vienna came to love for their
rhythmic vitality and appealing lyricism. People in Vienna used to say
that the waltzes of the first Johann Strauss were _made_ for dancing
because their rhythmic pulse excited the heart and made feet restless.
Not much of the father Strauss’ library of music has survived. The
exceptions are the following waltzes: _Caecilien_, _Donaulieder_, the
_Kettenbruecken_, and the _Lorelei Rheinsklaenge_. To the waltz, the
older Johann Strauss brought a symphonic dimension it had heretofore not
known, particularly in his spacious introductions of which the
thirty-bar prelude of the _Lorelei Rheinsklaenge_ is an outstanding
example. He also carried over to the waltz a variety of mood and feeling
and a lightness of touch new for this peasant dance. “This demon of the
ancient Viennese folk spirit,” wrote Richard Wagner after hearing
Strauss perform one of his own waltzes in Vienna, “trembled at the
beginning of a new waltz like a python preparing to spring, and it was
more the ecstasy produced by the music than the drinks among the
enchanted audience that stimulated that magical first violin to almost
dangerous flights.”
Of his other music the most famous is the _Radetzky March_. Count
Radetzky was an Austrian military hero, victor over the Italians in
1848-1849. In honor of his Italian triumphs and suppression of the
Italian nationalist movement, Strauss wrote the spirited, sharply
accented march in 1848 which almost at once became the musical symbol of
Hapsburg Vienna and Austrian military power. The following programmatic
interpretation of this music by H. E. Jacob is of interest: “Drunk with
triumph, the Generalissimo’s battalions hurl themselves down into
Lombardy. They are close on the heels of the fleeing troops of King
Albert, the King of Sardinia. And then comes a new phase of the march to
accompany the victorious troops. A different sun shines down on this, a
memory of Vienna, a lingering trace of the feel of girls’ arms; scraps
of a dance song with a backward glance at three-quarter time. But on
they go, still forward. There are no more shots, there is laughter. The
trio follows. The ... superdominant ... hoisted as if it were a flag....
Finally comes the return of the principal theme with the laurels and
gaiety of victory.”