Music: Strauss v. Munich

Richard Strauss was born in Munich and lived there, or not far away, much of his life, but he feuded with the staid Münchners for rejecting his first (1893) opera, Guntram. The Munich Opera dropped it after only one disconsolate performance. Strauss's revenge: his very next opera, Feuersnot (1901), a go-minute twitting of Munich's conservative burghers. At the current Munich Festival, opera fans flocked to see their first Feuersnot in more than 20 years, heartily applauded the lampooning administered to them from across the footlights.

The stage set got in the first dig: the houses of old Munich were actually stylized caricatures...

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