Operetta in three acts
Music by Johann Strauss
Libretto by Heinrich Bohrmann, Richard Genée, Julius Rosen and O. F. Berg
In German with German and English surtitles

Premiere: January 18, 2025

Conductor: Martynas Stakionis
Director: Christian Thausing

Wiener KammerOrchester
Arnold Schoenberg Chor
Conductor: Erwin Ortner

To mark the 200th birthday of Johann Strauss in 2025 his operetta Das Spitzentuch der Königin (The Queen’s Lace Handkerchief) returns on 18 January to the venue at which it was first performed in 1880. The waltz king’s seventh operetta was an immediate hit, and his biggest success up to that point, since it was so obviously a parody of the rebellious Crown Prince Rudolf, whose liberal ideas were giving the Habsburg monarchy such a headache. In this tale, Portugal is ruled by an unscrupulous prime minister who plans to sell the country off to the Spanish crown. And because the young king shows as little interest in politics as he does in his queen, devoting his time instead to delicious truffle pâtés and flirtations with other women, Portugal seems doomed. Luckily, the writer Cervantes, on the run from henchman, takes refuge in Lisbon where he very humorously interferes in the affairs of state, saves the country and in the process picks up a lot of ideas for his satirical novel Don Quixote. Following Crown Prince Rudolf’s scandalous suicide in Mayerling in 1889 the operetta disappeared from the repertoire overnight. Strauss, however, reused its main theme in his waltz Rosen aus dem Süden (Roses from the South), still a hugely popular piece today. Das Spitzentuch der Königin is a treasure trove of delightful and catchy melodies, and the fact that Strauss repeatedly has all of Portugal dancing waltzes leaves no doubt about which monarchy he is poking fun at here …