Just a few months after completing his Cello Sonata op. 6, Strauss composed another work for this instrument: a Romance for cello and orchestra, which remained unpublished during his lifetime. According to the autograph manuscript, the composition was finished on June 27, 1883, and Strauss also prepared the piano reduction himself. The Romance is regarded as one of Strauss’ most mature youthful works, though it was long overshadowed by the cello sonata, despite several quite successful performances given by the then-famous principal cellist of the Munich Court Orchestra, Hanuš Wihan. Only since the posthumous first edition of 1986 has the music world been rediscovering this striking work, which now also appears in a Henle Urtext edition.
G. Henle Publishers stands for Urtext sheet music of the highest quality. The Urtext editions not only provide the undistorted and authoritative musical text but are also aesthetically pleasing, optimised for practical use and extremely durable. And then there is the strong, distinctive blue profile: (almost) all of the Urtext editions are bound in the characteristic blue cardboard.
Musicians trust Henle's blue Urtext editions because they:
- provide an undistorted, reliable and authoritative musical text
- offer superb, aesthetically appealing music engraving
- are optimized for practical use (page turns, fingerings)
- are of high quality and durable (cover, paper, binding)
- contain a short preface that introduces the work (particularly useful for AMEB exams) in German, English and French, as well as explanatory footnotes for particularly interesting passages in the score
- contain a description of the sources, an evaluation of the sources, readings and a documentation of the corrections made (= "Critical Report") in German and English, and often also in French
