Johann Baptist Strauss II, also known as Johann Strauss Jr., the Younger or the Son, was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas as well as a violinist. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas and a ballet. In his lifetime, he was known as "The Waltz King", and was largely responsible for the popularity of the waltz in Vienna during the 19th century. Some of Johann Strauss's most famous works include "The Blue Danube", "Kaiser-Walzer", "Tales from the Vienna Woods", "Frühlingsstimmen", and the "Tritsch-Tratsch-Polka". Among his operettas, Die Fledermaus and Der Zigeunerbaron are the best known.
Oscar Nathan Straus was a Viennese composer of operettas, film scores, and songs. He also wrote about 500 cabaret songs, chamber music, and orchestral and choral works. His original name was actually Strauss, but for professional purposes he deliberately omitted the final 's'. He wished not to be associated with the musical Strauss family of Vienna. However, he did follow the advice of Johann Strauss II in 1898 about abandoning the prospective lure of writing waltzes for the more lucrative business of writing for the theatre.
The Great Waltz is a musical conceived by Hassard Short with a book by Moss Hart and lyrics by Desmond Carter, using themes by Johann Strauss I and Johann Strauss II. It is based on a pasticcio by Erich Wolfgang Korngold and Julius Bittner called Walzer aus Wien, first performed in Vienna in 1930. The story of the musical is loosely based on the real-life feud between the older and younger Strauss, allegedly because of the father's jealousy of his son's greater talent.
Aschenbrödel (Cinderella) is a ballet written by Johann Strauss II. He had written all the principal parts of the ballet, and was intending to fill in the orchestration as time permitted. However, Strauss died in 1899, and it was finished by composer Josef Bayer in 1900.
Wiener Blut Op. 354 is a waltz by Johann Strauss II first performed by the composer on 22 April 1873. The new dedication waltz was to celebrate the wedding of the Emperor Franz Joseph I's daughter Archduchess Gisela Louise Maria and Prince Leopold of Bavaria. However, the waltz was also chiefly noted by Strauss' biographers as the début of Strauss with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra where for many years, the Philharmonic had dismissed any association with the 'Waltz King' as it had not wished to be associated with mere 'light' or 'pops' music. The festival ball celebrating the event was held at the Musikverein Hall which is the venue for the present day Neujahrskonzert.
"Frühlingsstimmen", Op. 410 is an orchestral waltz, with optional solo soprano voice, written in 1882 by Johann Strauss II.
Waltzes from Vienna is a 1934 British biographical film directed by Alfred Hitchcock, sometimes known as Strauss' Great Waltz. It was part of the cycle of operetta films made in Britain during the 1930s.
Wiener Blut is an 1899 operetta named after Johann Strauss II's eponymous 1873 waltz. It was made with Strauss' approval, but without his participation. Its score reuses music he wrote for other works along with some music by his brother Josef Strauss; the job of compilation went to Adolf Müller. Its libretto is by Victor Léon and Leo Stein. The setting is the Congress of Vienna. Strauss may have seen a draft of the work, but he died a few months before its 26 October premiere at Vienna's Carltheater.
Miliza Elizabeth Korjus was a Polish-Estonian lyric coloratura soprano opera singer who appeared in classical American and Mexican sound films during the Golden Age of Hollywood. Korjus became a naturalized United States citizen in her adulthood. She was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1938 for her performance in The Great Waltz.
Richard Franz Joseph Heuberger was an Austrian composer of operas and operettas, a music critic, and teacher.
Robert Elisabeth Stolz was an Austrian songwriter and conductor as well as a composer of operettas and film music.
Helmuth Lohner was an Austrian actor, theatre director, and from 1997 to 2006 director of the Theater in der Josefstadt.
Fernand Gravey, also known as Fernand Gravet in the United States, was a Belgian-born French actor.
Franz Friedrich Richard Genée was a Prussian born Austrian librettist, playwright, and composer.
Vienna Waltzes is a ballet choreographed by George Balanchine to music by Johann Strauss II, Franz Lehár and Richard Strauss, made as a tribute to Austria. It premiered on June 23, 1977 at the New York State Theater, performed by the New York City Ballet, and was an immediate success among the public.
The Great Waltz is a 1972 American biographical musical film directed by Andrew L. Stone, and starring Horst Buchholz, Mary Costa, and Nigel Patrick, that follows 40 years in the life of composer Johann Strauss and his family. It is based on the musical The Great Waltz, and was Stone's final film. M-G-M released a previous film adaptation in 1938, which is about a different phase of the younger Strauss's life.
The Vienna Hofburg Orchestra is an Austrian classical orchestra based in Vienna.
Court Waltzes is a 1933 musical film directed by Ludwig Berger and Raoul Ploquin and starring Fernand Gravey, Armand Dranem and Madeleine Ozeray. It was the French-language version of Waltz War, made by the German studio UFA and also directed by Berger. In the early years of sound it was common to shoot completely separate versions of films in different languages before dubbing became more established. It was part of a trend of operetta films released during the decade.
The Strauss Dynasty is an Austrian biographical film in six parts from 1991. It depicts the careers of Johann Strauss (father), the composer of the Radetzky March, and his son Johann Strauss (son) ("Schani"), the composer of the waltz The Blue Danube, who, despite his father's resistance, also became a musician and competed with his father as a waltz composer.
