The American Symphony Orchestra (ASO) is honored and pleased to be able to mount this concert performance of Richard Strauss’s first opera, Guntram, which the composer completed in 1893. I am particularly delighted that Bryan Gilliam, who, in my opinion, is the finest Strauss scholar working today, has written the program notes for this performance. I recommend to all Gilliam’s terrific 2018 book on the operas of Strauss, Rounding Wagner’s Mountain.

As the title of the book and Gilliam’s notes suggest, Guntram’s fate was to be consigned to the margins and essentially forgotten. The main reason was the extent to which the opera betrayed a debt to Richard Wagner. As Gilliam observes, Strauss never forgave Munich for its rejection of the work and indeed, the first in his long series of fabulous and mostly successful operas, the comedy Feuersnot from 1901 (which the ASO performed at Carnegie Hall in 2013), takes explicit revenge by skewering the city’s
cultural conceits.

Strauss’s bitter reaction to the fate of Guntram confirms three quite common human traits. First, it has always been hard to get started as a composer without indulging in imitation. This was especially true in the 1890s, given the unprecedented dominance of Wagner, who died in 1883, having left posterity his final work, Parsifal (1882), a work that would fascinate—if not mesmerize—many in the younger generation, including both Strauss and Claude Debussy. Parsifal also repelled others, particularly Friedrich Nietzsche (for its ideology) and Igor Stravinsky (for its unjustifiable length).

Second, no one forgets or forgives negative criticism and failure, which in the case of opera is defined by being overlooked and forgotten after, at best, a few initial performances, and therefore blocked from entering the active repertory. It is humiliating to see one’s work dismissed, condescended to, and pontificated about by people who see themselves as experts but are not, and yet exert real influence on the public, and therefore one’s career and reputation. Failing with opera is particularly egregious, given the time and effort required to write one.

It is impressive that Strauss persevered and returned to opera, only to triumph. Failure, we are routinely told, can inspire and motivate. But even then, a negative critical response suggests the third trait, which is that no amount of success will suffice to compensate for past failure. Strauss resented not only the fate of Guntram, but the neglect, later in his career, of the 1928 Die ägyptische Helena. Strauss, however, was not paralyzed by bad press, as was, for example Paul Dukas, one of the few French composers Strauss admired, by critics and poor box office results. Rather Strauss was inspired to fight back, press a case for these works, and have the last laugh, which he did. At the same time, all the praise and profits from Salome (1905) and Der Rosenkavalier (1910) never healed the wound (like that of Amfortas in Parsifal until the end when displaced) inflicted on him by Guntram’s failure. Its injustice haunted him. I once asked a famous writer, “How long does it take to forget a bad review?” The answer was swift and simple: “Never.”

However, enough time has passed for us, in the 21st century, to discard the received wisdom and endlessly repeated critical consensus about works we have inherited but never performed. There is no need to argue with past critics, only to forget them. Guntram deserves a place on the stage and in concert—as Mahler realized (and Gilliam points out). The ASO takes pride in its role in bringing back to life several neglected but great Strauss operas: Die ägyptische Helena (performed in 2019), Die Liebe der Danae (performed in 2011), Friedenstag (performed in 2016), Die schweigsame Frau (performed in 2022), and Daphne (performed here at Carnegie Hall in 2023). If opera is to thrive as a contemporary art form, its finest works from the past must be properly and fully represented in concert and in fully staged productions. That means taking a new look at history. That, in turn, is a necessary condition for inspiring the creation of compelling new works and developing a receptive audience.

Therefore, a central part of the mission of the ASO each year, is to revive operatic masterpieces whose rarity and even disappearance are historical injustices based on obsolete judgments from the past that new generations of artists and listeners may not share. We thereby seek to bring relief to the numbing and narrow standard historic repertory that still dominates the active operatic repertory by giving us all a chance to change our minds.

I want to thank the audience for its support this season and look forward to experiencing 2025–2026 with you all.