Concerto for Oboe and Small Orchestra

Richard Strauss – Oboe Concerto, TrV 292 (1945)

Concerto in D major for Oboe and Small Orchestra, TrV 292 (1945)
Richard Strauss (1864-1949)

François Leleux (oboe)
Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra
Daniel Harding (conductor)
2010

00:00 1. Allegro moderato
08:29 2. Andante
17:22 3. Vivace – Allegro

Strauss’ Oboe Concerto (1945-1946) dates from the final stages of the composer’s career. As a product of his lifetime of experience, it ranks as one of the finest works ever composed for the instrument. Strauss wrote the concerto at the suggestion of John De Lancie, an American soldier and professional oboist stationed near Garmisch at the end of the Second World War.
Following the classical model, the concerto is cast in a fast-slow-fast three-movement form. The opening Allegro moderato features interplay between the oboe and solo flute and clarinet in a sort of concertato treatment. The elegiac Andante echoes the more meditative moods of the composer’s later operas. While the harmonic language is essentially diatonic, Strauss makes full use of colorful chromatic inflections. The movement is remarkable for its intensity and seamlessness, in contrast to the more motivic and episodic nature of some of Strauss’ music. The concluding Vivace has the playful character of the composer’s incidental score to Der Bürger aus Edelmann (1917) or the opera Der Rosenkavalier (1909-1910). The oboe commands center stage throughout with angular leaps and shifts of register.
The concerto is further notable for Strauss’ economical scoring. This mode of relative austerity — in comparison to the expansive instrumentation of Strauss’ earlier tone poems and operas — is a feature of much of the composer’s late music, including the Sonatina No. 2 for 16 winds (1943-1945) and Metamorphosen for 23 strings (1944-1945).