Arabella

Music

Richard Strauss (born Munich, 11 June 1864; died Garmisch, 8 September 1949)

Text

Hugo von Hofmannsthal (born Vienna, 1 February 1874; died Rodaun, 15 July 1929)

Source

Original.

Premieres

First Performance: Dresden (Opernhaus), 1 July 1933.

First performance in United Kingdom: London (Covent Garden) 17 May 1934.

Not yet performed in Scotland.

Background

Arabella is the last of the six operas for which Hofmannsthal supplied Strauss with a text, and he died before the music was composed. It is a comedy set in Vienna in 1860, the period when Johann Strauss was reaching his peak, while in Paris, Offenbach was also very popular. Both cities were booming and undergoing massive rebuilding works, which in Vienna involved construction of the Ringstrasse. The Waldner family, central to the plot, are aristocratic, but financially overstretched in a society of feverish overindulgence. The Austro-Hungarian Empire is visibly crumbling.

Musically. there are lots of luscious sequences, including a duet for the two sisters and several decadent waltz numbers.

Main characters

Count Waldner, an impoverished ex-army officer (bass).

Countess Adelaide, his wife (mezzo-soprano).

Arabella, their elder daughter (soprano).

Zdenka, their younger daughter (soprano).

Mandryka, a wealthy Croation landowner (baritone).

Matteo, an army officer (tenor).

Count Elemer, a suitor to Arabella (tenor).

Fiakermilli, the cabbies' mascot (soprano).

A fortune-teller (soprano).

Plot summary

Count Waldner is on his uppers, partly due to his gambling habit. He has brought the family to Vienna, staying in a hotel he cannot afford. He has one purpose, to get his elder daughter Arabella off his hands through marriage to a wealthy husband. His wife enjoys regular dealings with a fortune-teller, who rarely gives good news. To assist matters, and reduce expense, Zdenka is being presented in disguise as a boy - no need for him to emerge during the season.

Arabella has four suitors. Counts Elemer, Dominik and Lamoral are wealthy idiots. Matteo is an army officer. They are all completely ignored by Arabella, who is determined to wait for the right man. She has seen a gentleman on her morning walk who has aroused her curiosity. However Zdenka has fallen for Matteo, and has been writing love-letters to him, impersonating her sister, while also spending time repelling her father's creditors.

Count Waldner has written to an old army colleague, enclosing a portrait of Arabella in the hope that he will marry her. A gentleman arrives to visit the Count. He is Mandryka, nephew and heir to Waldner's old friend, who has died. He makes enquiries about Arabella, and she recognises him as her mysterious stranger.

Today is Shrove Tuesday, and the evening sees the Cabmens' Ball, one of the events of the social calendar. All the characters attend, and complications ensue.