Amor Op.68 No.5

Richard Strauss (1864-1949)

Amor Op.68 No.5

Richard Strauss was, of course, no relation to the Strauss family in Vienna. The foremost of German composers for several decades round the turn of the 20th century, he was active in a far wider range of music than the Viennese Strausses. He did, however, spend some time in Vienna and he certainly learned much about the waltz from the Strauss examples, as his most popular opera Der Rosenkavalier amply demonstrates. There are instances of waltz time in his songs too, though not so much in Amor which, though in triple time, is more about flying than dancing. It is a setting of a poem by Clemens Brentano about the child-god Cupid who fans a fire with his wings, sets them alight and seeks help from the shepherdess, which she gives – but not without risking the danger of being pierced by one of his darts of love. Here Strauss indulges himself in the joy of writing an elaborately decorative, high-lying vocal line, replete with trills and roulades, for an uncommonly agile coloratura soprano to a finely detailed small-orchestral accompaniment.