Capriccio by Richard Strauss · Synopsis, Premiere & Arias

Capriccio, Op. 85, is the final opera by German composer Richard Strauss, subtitled "A Conversation Piece for Music". It received its premiere performance at the Nationaltheater München on 28 October 1942. Strauss and Clemens Krauss wrote the German libretto, but its genesis came from Stefan Zweig in the 1930s, and Joseph Gregor further developed the idea several years later. Strauss then took it on, but finally recruited Krauss as his collaborator. Most of the final libretto is by Krauss. The opera originally consisted of a single act lasting close to two and a half hours. This, in combination with the work's conversational tone and emphasis on text, has prevented it from achieving great popularity. But at Hamburg in 1957, Rudolf Hartmann, who directed the opera at its premiere in Munich, inserted an interval at the point when the Countess orders chocolate, and other directors have often followed suit, including performances at Glyndebourne Festival Opera. The final scene for Countess Madeleine is often heard as an excerpt. Capriccio received its American professional premiere at The Santa Fe Opera in 1958 after the Juilliard School staged it in 1954 with Gloria Davy and Thomas Stewart as the aristocratic siblings.

For readers approaching Capriccio for the first time, the entry below sets out the dramatic situation, the principal musical highlights, and the work's place in performance history. Detailed scholarly editions of the score and libretto remain the indispensable companions to any serious study of the opera.

Background & Context

Capriccio belongs to the standard operatic repertoire and is documented in the OperaPedia archive as a complete editorial entry. Composed by Richard Strauss, the work is preserved in the canon of the early-modern moment when the orchestra became a co-equal voice to the singers. It received its first performance in 1942 at Nationaltheater München.

Like many works of the Early Modern period, Capriccio is built around the alternation of solo aria, ensemble, and orchestral commentary characteristic of the form. Sung in German, the opera draws its rhetorical pace from the natural rhythms of the language and the inflections that the composer found in its consonants and vowels.

Critical reception of Capriccio has shifted with the broader currents of operatic taste. Where earlier audiences may have valued the immediate theatrical effect of a star turn, modern listeners and conductors increasingly attend to the work's harmonic logic, its handling of orchestral colour, and the precision of its text-setting.

Singers approaching the principal roles will find the writing characteristic of Richard Strauss's mature manner: long phrases that demand both a flexible technique and a sustained legato line, with ensemble passages that reward careful attention to ensemble blend and pace.

Synopsis

The dramatic action of Capriccio unfolds across multiple acts, set primarily in scenes that combine ensemble writing with extended solo arias for the principal voices. The libretto draws on dramatic conventions familiar to audiences of the Early Modern era, and the score by Richard Strauss is structured around a sequence of recitatives, arias, and choral interventions typical of the form.

Like much of the standard operatic repertoire, the work blends private emotional crisis with public spectacle. The opening act establishes the central characters and the conflict that will drive the drama; the middle of the opera develops that conflict through arias of recognition, ensembles of confrontation, and one or more set-pieces that allow the principal singers to demonstrate the full range of their vocal art. The closing act resolves the action, often through a large ensemble that draws together every voice on stage.

Critical assessments from later generations consistently emphasise the score's harmonic invention and its sensitivity to the rhythms of the German text. Productions in the modern era have approached the work in a variety of stylistic registers, from period-instrument revivals attentive to seventeenth- and eighteenth-century performance practice to contemporary stagings that relocate the action to the present day in the search for fresh dramatic resonance.

Notable Arias & Musical Highlights

Among the musical episodes most cherished by audiences of Capriccio are the principal solo arias, in which the voice steps forward from the orchestral fabric to deliver the central emotional argument of each act. The vocal writing, characteristic of Richard Strauss's mature manner, calls for both flexible coloratura and sustained lyrical line. The great interpreters of the role have always been those who can find the shape of the long phrase without sacrificing dramatic urgency.

The orchestral preludes, dance episodes, and act-closing ensembles also deserve mention. Conductors approaching the score for the first time often note how carefully the composer balances the practical needs of the singers against the demands of the dramatic situation: tempi must breathe enough for the words to land, but never slacken so far as to lose the architectural arc of the act.

For singers preparing roles in Capriccio, the standard editions of the score remain the essential reference. Voice teachers and coaches typically pair the principal arias with carefully chosen technical exercises that address the specific demands of Richard Strauss's vocal writing: the breath control required for the long-spun cantilena, the agility needed for ornamented passages, and the dramatic concentration that makes the recitatives land.

Premiere & Production History

Capriccio received its first performance in 1942 at Nationaltheater München. Contemporary accounts describe an audience response shaped as much by the fashions of the day as by the merits of the score itself; subsequent revivals, however, established the work's place in the repertory.

The twentieth century brought a sequence of important revivals, often led by conductors and stage directors associated with the broader rediscovery of Early Modern opera. In recent decades, the work has been mounted by major houses across Europe and North America, with notable studio recordings and house premieres documenting changing performance practice. Editors and musicologists continue to refine the critical edition of the score, restoring passages cut in earlier theatrical traditions and clarifying the composer's intentions in matters of orchestration and tempo.

An Intermission

About the Composer

Richard Strauss is the composer of record for this opera.

Read the full biography of Richard Strauss →

Other Operas by Richard Strauss

Related Operas in the Catalogue

Listeners drawn to Capriccio may wish to explore the following entries from the same era or the same operatic tradition:

Puss in Boots · César Cui, 1913
Bilby's Doll · Carlisle Floyd, 1928
Die Göttin der Vernunft · Johann Strauss II, 1897
Das Mädchen aus Domrémy · Giselher Klebe, 1976
Hlas lesa · Bohuslav Martinů, 1935
Ashig Garib · Zulfugar Hajibeyov, 1916

Editorial Note

This entry is part of OperaPedia's continuing project to document the canonical operatic literature. Sources for this article include the Wikidata structured-data layer for opera works (Q1344) and the corresponding English Wikipedia articles, both reproduced here under the editorial conventions of an encyclopaedia. Where our entry diverges from those sources, the difference reflects editorial judgment rather than disagreement with the underlying scholarship.