Note: There was no relationship between Oscar Straus (one "s") and the famous musical Strauss ("ss") family, a fact which was to cause much confusion during his lifetime. The most prominent members of the latter were Johann I, whose most popular work is probably the Radetzky March and Johann II, the 'Waltz King' whose works include On the Beautiful Blue Danube and the operetta Die Fledermaus. There are a number of theories about why the second 's' was dropped from Oscar's family name. His father's family had owned a feather factory for many years (Strauss is German for "ostrich"), and some say a registrar made the mistake of using only one 's' and that spelling continued. Oscar later said in answer to questions about his relation to Johann Strauss: "For sixty years ... I have been hearing the same old question, although I keep on telling people the same thing almost every day: our families have nothing to do with one another. I am not related to him by blood but by precept and example".

YOUTH
Oscar was born in Vienna on March 6, 1870. His father had been sent from his native city, Mannheim, Germany, to Vienna to learn the banking trade, He married bank manager's daughter and never went home. She came from very large Viennese family who all lived together, 20-30 in a huge house furnished with antiques and important paintings. The whole clan spent the summers in the resort town, Bad Ischl There, every morning they went for a walk in procession, Grandmother in a sedan chair and Grandfather in his top-hat in front, followed by all the uncles and aunts and then the with children, including Oscar, trailing in the rear. In the afternoons the boy was free to go where he pleased and liked the band concerts. Soon his mind was made up — he wanted a drum and a trumpet. The family gave in, and he developed a way to play both at the same time, much to the dismay of the quiet people of Bad Ischl. Among those who complained were composers Johannes Brahms and Johann Strauss whose work was disturbed by the noise. The famous composers threatened to move away, much to the dismay of the other citizens, so Oscar was switched to the piano and given a teacher. A piece he wrote at about age ten already foreshadowed some of the elements in A Waltz Dream.

Although not a good student in school, he was determined to become a musician. At age sixteen he was taken to operas and operettas, including The Mikado. This Gilbert and Sullivan work was to change the direction of his life, and he refused to go into any of the family businesses. The family had to decide between sending him to America (a then common practice for recalcitrant young men) or allowing him to become a musician. They arranged for him to meet Brahms who decided he had possibilities and recommended a teacher. Although old and ill, for ten years Brahms befriended the boy and became his mentor. He was always Straus's favorite composer.

At age twenty, Straus suddenly announced to his family that he was going to Paris. Although they were shocked at the very idea of him going to such a sinful city, his grandfather once again came to his rescue and arranged for him to meet the French composer Delibes. However, when Straus arrived in Paris, the neighborhood of the Opéra was draped in black; Delibes had just died! Oscar left for Berlin where he studied with Max Bruch. For three years he was miserable under the famous composer, who recognized his talent but gave him only serious, depressing things to study and refused to even look at the young man's attempt at opera. Bruch was scornful of those Oscar admired: Delibes, Offenbach and Strauss. He finally ordered him out of his house ending:"My curse on you also if you ever dare commit musical monstrosities in the same vein as your miserable namesake!", i.e. Strauss. Oscar returned to Vienna.

He was anxious to have some of his songs published but music publishing companies were not interested; he would have to pay the cost himself. Once more his grandfather agreed on the condition that the well-known critic Hanslick thought they were worthwhile. The verdict was that they were "fresh, simple, and agreeable" but added that Straus should not send him anything else. It was enough for Grandfather; he paid and Oscar's music reached the public. Soon he met Johann Strauss and was invited to show the Waltz King some of his own waltzes. Strauss was impressed and advised him to forget dreams of symphonies and grand operas and to concentrate on operetta-type music. He should start by spending a few years as a conductor in the provinces. Oscar followed the advice by conducting everything from Viennese farces to Wagner operas and, occasionally he was able to program his own works. Then, for a time, he was assistant to Gustav Mahler.

In 1896, against the wishes of both families, he married a violinist, Nelly Irmen. They had three children but the marriage eventually broke up. Meanwhile, publishing houses began to print his works at their expense and even pay him. On a return trip to Berlin he met fellow musician and conductor Leo Fall who was a friend of Franz Lehár and who dreamt of setting up his own operetta company; Vienna was full of operetta and opportunity was knocking. The pair lived hand-to-mouth in Berlin, taking a series of menial music jobs to live. One day they were seated in a café when one Karl Rössler appeared looking for someone who could play in piano in the cabaret Überbrettl for him and compose the occasional song. Fall was not interested but Straus went for an interview.

SUCCESS
One hundred years behind England, Berlin was starting to develop cabaret/music hall type entertainment; Germany had had no such tradition. The impresario Wolzogen had asked Richard Strauss and Humperdinck about the cabaret job, but they were not interested, so he hired Straus to serve as accompanist, composer and conductor, on a temporary basis, until he could find someone better known. The opening was a tremendous success and Oscar Straus became an overnight celebrity. The leading singer and Oscar sang The Merry Husband together, and soon the new songs introduced that evening swept all of Germany. The Merry Husband came to be a tradition sung at German wedding eve parties. Strauss received raise after raise and doors the of Berlin society opened to him. He composed about 500 songs, a ballet, a musical play and a short operetta, before leaving and returning to Vienna.

Home again, Straus began to compose his first full length operetta, based on the German legends of the Nibelungs, poking fun, not at Wagner himself, but at the pompous Wagnerians dedicated to being "keepers of Germany's artistic Holy Grail". The Merry Nibelungs was a critical success but the Viennese public did not take to it. Berlin however appreciated the parodies. A second operetta Hugdietrich's Bridal Journey also failed to capture Vienna. Just three months before, The Merry Widow, a new type of musical theatre, had opened and was sweeping Europe. Straus saw it and resolved to change his direction, leaving parodies and creating pieces about human beings. "I wrote my Waltz Dream with the direct and conscious intention, openly admitted, of equaling the records set up by The Merry Widow, and perhaps even breaking them." In that, he was successful. A Waltz Dream made him rich, partly from sales of sheet music to be played at home — there was, of course, no radio or phonograph. He became the most important composer of operetta in Vienna and remained so for the rest of his life, a social lion and sought after, for a while, as an eligible bachelor.

LATER WORKS
Straus's next big success was The Chocolate Soldier based on the play Arms and the Man by George Bernard Shaw. (During the run he met and married his second wife Clara.) Shaw did not want to give the rights to adapt the story, and he insisted all advertisements, reviews etc. stress that Straus's was an unauthorized version. He also refused to accept any fees and would have nothing at all to do with it.

During the heyday of operetta about 700 were produced in Vienna alone but, of these, only about ten had a long successful life. Among these are: Johann Strauss's Die Fledermaus and the Gypsy Baron, Lehar's The Merry Widow and Straus's own A Waltz Dream and The Chocolate Soldier. However, the world was changing. In 1916 the Austrian Prime Minister was shot in a Viennese restaurant at which Straus was dining. A month later the old Emperor Franz Joseph died and, a month later, Europe was at war; the old Vienna, the fairytale-like waltz capital, had died. The city was no longer the place for Oscar Straus and his type of work, and he and his wife moved to Berlin. There he continued to compose and their house and Clara's salons became a Mecca for, not only the famous of Europe's musical and theatrical world, but also for people such as Albert Einstein who played his violin, accompanied by Straus on the piano.

In 1929 Straus suddenly received a telegram from Hollywood! Warner Brothers was offering him a three month contract to write music for movies. Nine days later he and Clara were on their way. When the ship reached New York he received a welcoming message signed by Jerome Kern, George Gershwin, Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, Rudolph Friml, Sigmund Romberg and Vincent Youmans, the giants of American musical theatre. At a performance of The Chocolate Soldier in New York, George Gershwin introduced himself to Straus and said this was his favorite musical. After the show they went to Gershwin's penthouse where, after supper, they talked together and played the piano until four in the morning. The American jazz composer became one of the Austrian waltz composer's closest friends.

After a few days the Strauses continued on to Los Angeles. There the welcoming committed included Deanna Durbin, Erich Korngold, Leopold Stokowski, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, Rudolph Friml, Gloria Swanson and Pola Negri. When he arrived at Warner Brothers he was welcomed with a banquet, then led to a lavish office suite which Al Jolson gave up for him! He continued to be interviewed and feted, but his requests about work for him to do met with only vague answers. After several such weeks he decided to relax, enjoy the weather and give parties. At one, Marlene Dietrich and Maurice Chevalier danced to A Waltz Dream with Oscar at the piano. A few weeks before the end of his contract, as the Strauses prepared to return to Europe he was asked by MGM to work on a film with Grace Moore and Walter Berry. Finished with that, they again prepared to return to Europe but, just as they were boarding the ship in New York, another telegram! This time, a film was being made by Paramount of A Waltz Dream (The Smiling Lieutenant) with Claudette Colbert, Miriam Hopkins and Maurice Chevalier; Straus was needed. One more they went back to Hollywood. When that film was done, they finally returned to Europe. On board the ship Oscar met and became friends with Arturo Toscanini.

The Smiling Lieutenant, 1931, was the first international film success for an operetta and, after a short stay in Vienna, Strauss was called back to Hollywood to write the score for a new film starring Chevalier and Jeanette Macdonald (One Hour With You). Back once again! Note: All these trips took place before there was a twelve hour flight from Europe to Los Angeles. Each trip required about five days at sea and several more by train!

WORLD WAR II
When Straus finally returned to Berlin, it was 1933. Germany had changed; a former corporal, Adolf Hitler, had just become its Chancellor, the Reichstag went up in flames and, as a Jew, Oscar Straus fled the country, returning to Ischl, Austria. Another offer from Hollywood set him traveling once more. When he was able to return to Austria the Anschluss soon changed everything and Oscar was forced to flee again. He managed to get onto a train for Zurich with only a small handbag. On the train, he had a chance encounter with a young man who recognized him and admired his work. From him he learned he needed an exit visa to leave the country, he had assumed his passport would be enough. Luckily the young man was a high German official and gave orders that Straus was to be allowed to continue on his trip without being asked for his papers. He finally reached Paris, but all his worldly goods had been left behind. After a short time, the Germans approached Paris and, once more, he and Clara fled, finally reaching Vichy (which became the war capital of Free France under DeGaulle). There he had an audience with Pétain whom he persuaded to allow him to leave once more for America. Making their way south the Strauses spent ten weeks in a small village near the Spanish border waiting to cross Spain into Portugal. They then took ship for America where the newspapers had been closely following his journey.

(While they were in Vichy, a Viennese S.S. regiment passed them. The young soldiers were whistling songs from A Waltz Dream. How could they have learned it? Goebbels had forbidden all performances including on the radio and on recordings many year tune, and that's where the boys had heard them.)

Soon he was busy composing and conducting all over United States and Canada. When he went to Hollywood, it too had changed. Gone was the earlier opulence; music making had become mechanized, dominated by technicians and sound-engineers. On his travels he was continually mistaken for Johann Strauss, who was long dead, and was asked to play The Blue Danube. However, he also received a note from Harry Truman while he was conducting in Washington: "I know it is not yours, but will you please play The Blue Danube for me? H.T. ". The president knew his music. Oscar was invited to conduct the premier performance of A Waltz Dream in Mexico where he and Clara received receptions worthy of royalty all over the country. Of course, thinking to honor him, all the bands played The Blue Danube and Radetzky March, the music of the other Strauss's.

LAST YEARS
On April 14, 1948, after ten years in America, Straus became a citizen, but World War II was over, and soon the Strauses returned to Europe and their beloved Ischl. Among the old friends to welcome him was Franz Lehár who was to die within two months. Alone among most of his Jewish colleagues the composer of The Merry Widow had remained in Austria during the German occupation. Since Vienna was changed almost beyond recognition Oscar spent most of his remaining days in Ischl. The opera house had been bombed out and the Carltheater was dilapidated. He did go to the capital to receive the city's highest honor the "Golden Ring of the City of Vienna". During the ceremonies the orchestra played the march from A Waltz Dream.

Soon the world came to Ischl: Greta Garbo, Gregory Peck, famous opera singers, et cetera. During a festival in his honor, the town named a piece of the river bank the OSKAR STRAUSS QUAY [sic]. The confusion with his name continued, even at home! He died in Ischl on January 11, 1951 having conducted God Save the King for three English kings, The Star-Spangled Banner for three presidents, and their anthems for many other heads of state. But his time had passed. In New York he had attended the opening night of Oklahoma and recognized a new age of musical plays had arrived; he knew only the best of his works might survive. His life had spanned the age from Napoleon III to Queen Elizabeth II, from Bismarck to Stalin, from Grant to Eisenhower, from Edison's talking machine to colored television, from the muzzle-loader to the hydrogen bomb. His first composition was a waltz, his last was boogie-woogie. With him died great Viennese operetta.

Note: Most of this was based on the book Prince of Vienna: The Life, the Times and the Melodies of Oscar Straus by Bernard Grun: W. H. Allen, London, 1955. It is based on interviews with Straus and his heirs and with access to all of his papers.

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Revised April 2009
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