Richard Strauss

Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks

Richard Strauss was aware (especially following the success of his 'Don Juan') of his reputation and above all of his 'value' as a composer, which led him to rewrite several of his successful works by hand and leave them to his descendants 'as valuable Christmas gifts'. In the case of the Eulenspiegel score, however, it was a genuine revision, which he marked with the instruction: '[…] with the second fair copy October 1944 once again revised and to be regarded as a new print (especially in the complete edition of my works). Dr. Richard Strauss.'

Hundreds of more precisely defined indications for articulation, dynamics and tempo, but especially an altered scoring at the end of the work (waiver of additional horns and trumpets) present the 'Till Eulenspiegel' in this Urtext edition for the first time in the version bequeathed by Strauss as the final version. The dedicatee of the work changed as well. Whereas the first edition was dedicated to the 'dear friend Dr. Arthur Seidl', Strauss dedicated his revision 'to the good Till on his 50th birthday'.