MEGAN Thomas (Soprano)
Tony CLOSE ( Violoncello)
THE WIRELESS MILITARY BAND
Conducted by B. WALTON O'DONNELL
.RICHARD STRAUSS describes his opera, The Rose
Bearer, as a Comedy for Music. To the ordinary listener it is much the easiest of all his works to understand and enjoy. There is nothing abstruse or unkindly in it, and the Waltz tunes in which it abounds make it plain how rich a vein of natural melody is his to draw upon when he chooses.
The opera is based on an old custom of a bygone age; a suitor used to arrange for a suitable messenger to carry a silver rose to his lady love in token of his devotion. The Rose Boarer in the opera is so much younger and handsomer than the real suitor that the lady is at once attracted by him, and the youth makes no secret of his admiration for her. In their duet they have already confessed something of their feelings for each other, before the rough and ready Baron arrives on the scene to press his suit. The opera has been criticized on the ground that at the old period in which it is set a waltz is really an anachronism. The effect is, however, so wholly pleasing that no one need worry about any such historical inaccuracy. Strauss has shown that he can compose waltzes of the most melodious order, in every way worthy rivals of ; those by his two great namesakes.
THE eighth, one of the brightest and most good-humoured of Beethoven's symphonies, was composed mainly during a visit which Beethoven paid to his brother Johann in Linz in 1812. He and his brother were at loggerheads over Johann's matrimonial "affairs, and Beethoven was, besides, in bad health. But there is no hint of trouble nor' despondency in the music, and indeed, when the Symphony appeared, it was criticized as being too lighthearted to be worthy of the great Beethoven.
This slow movement especially was though to be so wanting in seriousness that the Symphony was afterwards played with the great slow movement of the seventh added to it. The fallacy of any such criticism has long ago been recognized, and the whole work has as sure a place in the world's affections as any of the others.
