In 1945, World War II had turned decidedly in favor of the Allied Forces. United States GIs moved freely through war-torn Germany, eventually ending up on the front lawn of composer Richard Strauss. It was in this period that Strauss completed his paean to old Europe, Metamorphosen. Alex Ross, writing for The New Yorker, points out that Strauss, born in 1864 and dying in 1949, straddled impossibly disparate worlds, predating the German Empire and outlasting the Third Reich.

Metamorphosen, originally scored for 23 string players, is here condensed into the more intimate ensemble of string septet. Drawing heavily on the influence of Beethoven, Strauss actually quotes the famous Funeral March of Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony and cryptically places the words “In Memoriam!” in the score above the quotation.

This Special Event will explore the deeply moving post-Romantic score, and revel in the lush sorrow of one of this great composer’s final works.