Dario Salvi, conductor

Sofia Philharmonic and Chorus

Johann Strauss II was encouraged to write for the theatre by the management of the Theater an der Wien after an operetta by Offenbach caused a sensation in Vienna. Strauss was enjoying massive popularity with his waltzes at the time but he had no experience of writing stage works. Indigo und die Vierzig Räuber (‘Indigo and the Forty Thieves’) was the second operetta he composed, receiving considerable assistance in instrumentation and scoring from the conductor and composer, Richard Genée. It premiered in 1871 and became wildly popular receiving foreign productions. Saturated with dance rhythms, the score also features inspired lyrical writing for the principal two singers, and its glory lies in Strauss’s use of the waltz, sensuously employed, whether melancholic or rhapsodic.