‘On Tuesday evening the Medical Students’ Ball was held in the elegant and newly decorated rooms of the Sofiensaal establishment,’ the Vienna daily Neues Fremden-Blatt reported two days later, on Thursday 24 January 1867, and went on, ‘Joseph Strauss played an enchanting waltz, which was greeted with much applause and has already been published by Spina.’ ‘To the gentlemen students of medicine at the University of Vienna’ is the dedication which can be found on the title page of the piano edition of the new waltz. The term ‘delirium’ (‘Delirien’ is the plural form in German) is used to refer to a form psychosis with disorders of consciousness and orientation, sometimes with delusions. Such an acute psychic disorder can have organic causes, or be the result of drugs being consumed or withdrawn. Josef Strauss begins his new composition with an introduction which is completely atypical of previous Viennese waltzes: it is melancholy music which is struggling for freedom, which takes its direction from Richard Wagner’s art of instrumentation. The music is driven along for twenty-seven bars in 12/8 time, an ‘allegro maestoso’ with a nervous tremolo and frequent modulations as well as a series of diminished seventh chords, and in it there is a pathological component to be heard which certainly does justice to the title. In the spring and summer of 1867 the Viennese music publisher Carl Anton Spina quickly brought out an edition for piano solo and then one for piano duet, followed by an arrangement for violin and piano and, of course, the orchestral parts. Josef Strauss’s waltz Delirien is one of his best and most popular compositions, not least because of its introduction, a stroke of genius that places the work far above the reason why it was composed, that is to provide dance music for the medical students’ ball.
Friday, 26. October 201811.00 o' clock Vienna ⁄ Musikverein ⁄ The Große Musikvereinssaal
Fall Concert at Vienna Musikverein
Johannes Wildner conductor
Program Johann Strauss II : Ouverture to «Die Fledermaus» Johann Strauss II : At the Double! / Quick polka op. 348 Johann Strauss II : In Praise of Women / Polka mazurka op. 315 Josef Strauss : Delirien / Waltz op. 212 Johann Strauss II : Express Polka / Polka schnell op. 311 Johann Strauss II : With Us at Home / Waltz op. 361 Break Johann Strauss II : Bandits Galop / Polka schnell op. 378 Johann Strauss II : Farewell to Saint Petersburg / Waltz op. 210 Johann Strauss II : Egyptian March op. 335 Johann Strauss II : Csárdás from the opera «Knight Pásmán» op. 441 Johann Strauss II : Cuckoo Polka / Polka française op. 336 Johann Strauss II : Hunting / Quick polka op. 373 Johann Strauss II : The Blue Danube / Waltz op. 314
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