Balsirenen

Die lustige Witwe (The Merry Widow):

Waltz: Ballsirenen (Sirens of the Ball)

The most famous of all Lehár pieces, next to his Gold and Silver Waltz, is the so-called Merry Widow Waltz - the amorous melody of which is most effectively designed to re-ignite the passions of Count Danilo and the “merry widow” Hanna Glawari, who had once been lovers but who have since been separated. An almost equally popular number is Danilo’s carefree and charmingly dissolute Da geh’ ich zu Maxim (I’m off to Chez Maxim). The fact that Danilo’s song is not in waltz time didn’t deter the ingenious arranger, Hans Schott, from working it into both the introduction and the ending of a waltz sequence, Sirens of the Ball, which brings together all the best waltz tunes in the operetta - including, in pride of place, the Merry Widow Waltz.