Quotes about Richard Strauss

3 Sourced Quotes

On hearing the Grenadier Guards playing an arrangement of Richard Strauss' Elektra, he sent a message to the bandmaster:

His Majesty does not know what the Band has just played, but it is never to be played again.

George V of the United Kingdom

Our sensuous appreciation of the world and of the works created by man has, no doubt, a biological foundation, one shared by all human beings, but that is no use to us when we try to evaluate a Bach fugue or a Dostoevsky novel-or even the simple experience of a landscape, as our delight in the view of a mountain or a waterfall is also determined by the traditions of our culture. The coexistence of different criteria of judgment is, in any case, by now a fact of life. Beethoven cannot be judged or even understood by the standards of Mozart, however much he may have continued them, nor Berg by the standards of Wagner or Richard Strauss, nor Elliott Carter by the values of Ives and Stravinsky.

In truth, I became a conductor because deep down I wanted to conduct Brahmss four symphonies and Richard Strausss tone poems.