On 5 April 1874 Johann Strauss’s operetta Die Fledermaus (The Bat) had its premiere in the Theater an der Wien in Vienna, at a time when the Viennese still had all too unpleasant memories of the stock exchange crash of 9 May 1873 and the gigantic deficit of nineteen million gulden made by the World Exhibition held in Vienna in the same year. Many of them may thus have seen a thoroughly positive side to a view of life such as that sung about in Alfred’s drinking song in the finale of the first act of the operetta Die Fledermaus, ‘Happy is he who forgets what can no longer be changed,’ that is to say not worrying about either the past or the future but living exclusively for the moment. The same attitude to life is described by the Spanish writer Baltasar Gracián y Morales in his Oracolo manual, published in 1674, two hundred years earlier. The educated bourgeoisie of Vienna may well have known about Gracían’s work, as a new translation by the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer had been published in 1862. The polka mazurka, ‘Glücklich ist, wer vergisst’ is one of six dances arranged from the melodies of the operetta Die Fledermaus. The publication of the piano edition was announced in the morning edition of the Tages-Presse newspaper on 11 October 1874 with the comment that the polka mazurka was ‘already very well-known from the performances of Mr Eduard Strauss’s orchestra’, that is to say that its first performance must have taken place at an earlier date, probably in the summer or autumn of 1874. Synopsis: Prof. Norbert Rubey
Saturday, 18. May 196819.30 o' clock Bern ⁄ (Exact place unknown)
Concert in Bern German, Suisse and Netherlands tour
Eduard Strauss II conductor Clementine Mayer soprano Peter Luipold tenor
Program Johann Strauss II : Ouverture to «Die Fledermaus» Johann Strauss II : Where the Lemon Trees Blossom / Waltz op. 364 Johann Strauss II : «Als flotter Geist», Entree couplet from the operetta “The Gypsy Baron” Josef Strauss : Moulinet Polka / Polka française op. 57 Johann Strauss II : Chit-Chat Polka op. 214 Josef Strauss : Village Swallows from Austria / Waltz op. 164 Johann Strauss II : « Happy Is He Who Forgets!», Polka Mazurka op. 368 Johann Strauss II : Eljen A Magyar! « Long Live the Magyar!» / Quick polka op. 332 Johann Strauss II : Emperor Waltz op. 437 Break Johann Strauss II : Perpetual Motion / Musical joke op. 257 Johann Strauss II : Lagunen-Walzer, nach Motiven der Operette "Eine Nacht in Venedig" op. 411 Johann & Josef Strauss : Pizzicato Polka Johann Strauss II : Cuckoo Polka / Polka française op. 336 Johann Strauss II : Wer uns getraut, Duett aus der Operette «Der Zigeunerbaron» Johann Strauss II : Anna Polka op. 117 Johann Strauss II : The Blue Danube / Waltz op. 314 Johann Strauss I : Radetzky March op. 228
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