Four Last Songs

Well, maybe Toscanini said it best: “For Strauss the composer, I take off my hat; for Strauss the man, I put it back on.”

Ouch. But there may have been some good reasons for Richard Strauss to be unpleasant. He was born in 1864 into a musical family; his father was a horn player in the Court Opera of Munich, and Richard Strauss grew up attending rehearsals of the Munich Court Orchestra.

He began composing young, and also conducting; he became the protégé of Hans von Bülow, who determined that Strauss would succeed him as conductor of the Meiningen orchestra.

His early compositions are in the tradition of Schumann and Mendelssohn; his work later became progressively more modern. And whatever else he was, he was a master of composing for the human voice, specifically the female voice. That’s not surprising, his wife—whom Wikipedia charitably describes as “irascible, garrulous, eccentric and outspoken”—was a famous soprano.

The couple had a son, who married a Jewish woman, Alice von Grab. In the Second World War, Strauss initially cooperates with Hitler, of whom he had a low opinion. In fact, Strauss became the president of the Reichsmusikkammer, the State Music Bureau. Later, he interceded several times to protect his daughter-in-law, even going to the Theresienstadt concentration camp to plead for the release of Alice’s mother. And he makes it clear in his diary of his contempt for the Nazis, writing, “I consider the Streicher-Goebbels Jew-baiting as a disgrace to German honour, as evidence of incompetence—the basest weapon of untalented, lazy mediocrity against a higher intelligence and greater talent.”

It tarnished him, this association with the Nazis, and may have been the reason for Toscanini’s remark above. But there’s no question, Straus looked at horror at what had become of his country, and wrote, “the most terrible period of human history is at an end, the twelve year reign of bestiality, ignorance and anti-culture under the greatest criminals, during which Germany's 2000 years of cultural evolution met its doom.”

In 1945, he was liberated by the Americans; he was also 81. He wrote his last works, of which the Four Last Songs are perhaps the most famous. He never lived to hear them performed; he died in 1949, the songs were first performed by Kirsten Flagstad in 1950.

There’s some question if Strauss meant the four song to be a unified set; the first three might be, since they are all based on poems by Hermann Hesse, the last is by Joseph von Eichendorff. In fact, it was the publisher who put them together and called them the Four Last Songs.

Whatever he meant, they’re some of the most beautiful, most haunting, most autumnal works around. By the end, Strauss seems beyond sorrow, even beyond acceptance; he seems transfigured.

Song 1: Spring

In shadowy crypts


I dreamt long


of your trees and blue skies,


of your fragrance and birdsong.



Now you appear


in all your finery,


drenched in light


like a miracle before me.



You recognize me,


you entice me tenderly.


All my limbs tremble

at
your blessed presence!


Song 2: September

The garden is in mourning.


Cool rain seeps into the flowers.


Summertime shudders,


quietly awaiting his end.



Golden leaf after leaf

falls
from the tall acacia tree.


Summer smiles, astonished and feeble,


at his dying dream of a garden.



For just a while he tarries


beside the roses,

yearning for repose.


Slowly he closes
his weary eyes.


Song 3: Going To Sleep

Now that I am wearied of the day,


my ardent desire shall happily receive


the starry night


like a sleepy child.



Hands, stop all your work.


Brow, forget all your thinking.


All my senses now
yearn

to sink into slumber.



And my unfettered soul


wishes to soar up freely


into night's magic sphere


to live there deeply and thousandfold.


Song 4: At Sunset

We have gone through sorrow and joy


hand in hand;

Now we can rest from our wandering


above the quiet land.



Around us, the valleys bow;


the air is growing darker.


Just two skylarks soar upwards


dreamily into the fragrant air.



Come close to me, and let them flutter.


Soon it will be time for sleep.


Let us not lose our way

in this solitude.



O vast, tranquil peace,


so deep at sunset!


How weary we are of wandering--


Is this perhaps death?