Der Rosenkavalier, Op. 59, is a comic opera in three acts by Richard Strauss to an original German libretto by Hugo von Hofmannsthal. It is loosely adapted from Louvet de Couvrai's novel Les amours du chevalier de Faublas and Molière's comedy Monsieur de Pourceaugnac. It was first performed at the Königliches Opernhaus in Dresden on 26 January 1911 under the direction of Max Reinhardt, with Ernst von Schuch conducting. Until the premiere, the working title was Ochs auf Lerchenau.
Ernst Edler von Schuch conducting Der Rosenkavalier (1912), by Robert Sterl
Richard Strauss in 1910
Hogarth's The Countess's Morning Levee (ca. 1744), the inspiration for the Marschallin's morning reception[citation needed]
1927 portrait of Richard Mayr as Ochs by Anton Faistauer. Mayr sang this role 149 times in Vienna, Salzburg and London.
Richard Georg Strauss was a German composer and conductor best known for his tone poems and operas. Considered a leading composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras, he has been described as a successor of Richard Wagner and Franz Liszt. Along with Gustav Mahler, he represents the late flowering of German Romanticism, in which pioneering subtleties of orchestration are combined with an advanced harmonic style.
Portrait of Strauss by Max Liebermann (1918)
Strauss aged 22
Pauline de Ahna Strauss, c. 1900
Strauss villa at Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Built 1906. Architect: Emanuel Seidl.