The opera was set in the mid-eighteenth century, before the advent of the waltz, and it was premiered in 1911, just as both the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the waltz were about to lose their foothold. Nothing, however, could have given his opera such an “authentic” Viennese flavor as the parody of the waltz established by the Johann Strauss family. By 1911 the sound of the waltz was literally bittersweet, as Austria had been suffering a host of misfortunes (economic depressions, imperial suicides, assassinations) for several decades that was to culminate in the loss of its empire after World War I. All of this is mirrored in the Marschallin’s bittersweet renunciation of her young lover. When, at the very end of the opera, she is observing the loving young couple and another character (Faninal) notes that “Sind halt also, die jungen Leut’,” (This is ever the way with the young), she wistfully replies, “Ja, ja,” her final words in the opera.
Under the leadership of Music Director Luis Biava, the Temple University Symphony Orchestra is comprised of undergraduate and graduate students who study and perform a full range or orchestral works. Students also perform with Temple’s Opera Theater and the Department of Choral Activities in major performances on and off campus. Orchestra alumni hold positions with many renowned orchestras, including The Philadelphia Orchestra, the Cleveland and Minnesota Orchestras, the Dallas, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Houston, Cincinnati and Hungarian Symphonies, the Hong Kong, Israel, Malaysia and Seoul Philharmonic Orchestras, the Chicago, Boston, Atlanta, Detroit and National Symphony Orchestras and the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra.
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