DON JUAN

Don Juan is a fictional libertine who spent his life seducing women. He is also known as Don Giovanni, which is the Italian variation on the Spanish ‘Juan’. There are variations on the theme, but it is always based around Don Juan’s womanising ways. The tale originated in Renaissance-era Spain.

Don Juan, tone poem for orchestra composed by German composer Richard Strauss, was first performed on November 11, 1889. One of the earliest tone poems by Strauss, Don Juan tells of the legendary Spanish libertine Don Juan, who by then already had appeared in works by Mozart and other composers. For his tone poem, Strauss drew upon a version of the Don Juan story by the Austrian poet published posthumously in 1851.

Strauss's depiction focuses on someone looking for but never finding his idealized vision of love and the work proceeds via a series of climaxes and disappointments ending in the protagonist's death in a duel. A single movement based on the broad narrative of Don Juan's life and death.