Sunday, May 20, 2018

Waltz "Du und Du," op. 367

Die Fledermaus draws on a variety of musical resources, including—as we have seen—popular dances of its era: the polka, galop, and waltz.

Strauss published a set of waltzes derived from the operetta; it is named "Du und Du," after the choral section of Falke's "Brüderlein und Schwesterlein" in Act II.


The set consists of an introduction, three waltzes (not the standard five), and a lengthy coda. The introduction immediately quotes "Brüderlein und Schwesterlein":

but before too long inches its way toward "Ha, welch ein Fest," the climactic dance of the Act II Finale:

The first waltz, then, offers up the two strains of that waltz:

Waltz n2 gives us Rosalinde's rebuke to the jail warden Frank in Act I and Adele's rebuke to Eisenstein from Act II.

Finally, n3 brings us two strains from "Du und Du":

In typical fashion, the coda then recapitulates several strains from the waltzes, separated by dramatic transitions.

As a point of interest, Strauss published several other pieces with material derived from Die Fledermaus: a Fledermaus-Polka, Op. 362; a Fledermaus-Quadrille, Op. 363; a polka "An der Moldau," Op. 366; and a polka-mazurka "Glücklish ist, wer vergisst!", Op. 368.