Fledermaus - Csárdás

Johann Strauss II

Die Fledermaus: Csárdás (“Klänge der Heimat”)

One way in which Rosalinde convinces her erring husband that she really is a Hungarian countess is to entertain Orlofsky’s guests with a stylish rendering of a show-stopping csárdás. The longest and most elaborate aria in the whole score – originally conceived as a purely instrumental piece – Rosalinde’s csárdás is introduced by an authentic-sounding Hungarian gypsy clarinet and includes, in the traditional manner, a characteristically nostalgic slow section followed by a brilliantly fiery ending.

Die Fledermaus - Csárdás (“Klänge der Heimat”)

Among the guests at Prince Orlofsky’s ball are Rosalinde and her parlour maid Adele, neither of them invited in her own name and neither aware of the other’s presence. Rosalinde’s disguise as a Hungarian countess is so effective that it deceives even her own husband, Gabriel von Eisenstein, who is also incognito and is posing as a French marquis. It is in order to prove her Hungarian credentials that Rosalinde takes it upon herself to sing the longest and most elaborate aria in the whole score - a csárdás introduced by an authentic-sounding Hungarian gypsy clarinet and consisting of a characteristically nostalgic slow section and a brilliantly fiery ending.

Johann Strauss II

Die Fledermaus - Csárdás

Hungary had little or nothing to do with the early development of either the Viennese waltz or the polka, but Hungarian-gypsy music - which had ready access to the Austro-Hungarian capital by way of the Danube - was a source of fascination and inspiration for Austrian composers from Haydn onwards. If gypsy bands were not as common in Strauss’s Vienna as they were less than 150 miles away in Budapest, their music was certainly part of Viennese popular culture - hence the immense success of Johann II’s operetta Der Zigeunerbaron (Gypsy Baron) at the Theater an der Wien in 1885

Eleven years earlier Johann II had included a colourful Hungarian episode in Die Fledermaus, which was a significant factor in making that work his first major success at the Theater an der Wien. The composer’s original intention was to introduce a gypsy band into the masked ball where most of the intrigue, much of it based on false identities, takes place. Later, having written a piece specially for the band, he changed his mind about a purely instrumental number and converted it into a showstopper for the leading soprano role, Rosalinde, who has turned up at the ball disguised as a Hungarian countess. Rediscovered in 1962 and published a few years later, the original instrumental piece - a csárdás introduced by an authentic-sounding clarinet and consisting of a characteristically nostalgic slow section and an authentically fiery ending - is no less a showstopper than its vocal version.