DESCRIPTION:
Richard Strauss
Romanze in F major for cello and orchestra (1883)

Misha Maisky, cello
Orchestre de Paris
Semyon Bichkov, conductor

Painting: Johann Heinrich Fuseli, The Nightmare

Richard Strauss's Romance in F major is a significant rediscovery. It did not receive its first modern performance until May 1986 at the Semper Opera House in Dresden. The piece belongs to the 'great workshop' (a real 'boutique fantasque') of juvenilia which prepares the way for and signals the great flowering of Strauss's creative output. The dominant mood is one of strong yet intimate lyricism, operatic in its sustained and characterful development. There is already a mastery of harmony and timbre which was to be typical of this composer. The cadenza-like recitatives which intervene dramatically before the lyrical melody returns lend the Romance some of the traditional features of a rondo.
From Music Notes by Alberto Cantù