Son and Grandson

As an only child, Franz Strauss (born in 1897) was especially attached to his parents. This was heightened by his sickliness during his first years. The Strauss biographer Kurt Wilhelm, who knew Franz personally, described him as, ‘a peaceful, calm, good-natured person, sensitive and vulnerable, with an intuitive feel for people, who would certainly have made more of his life had the dominating love of his parents not been stronger than his will.’

Bubi accompanied his father on his travels, helped with contracts and, with a heavy heart, abstained from studying medicine. Instead, he studied law and wrote his dissertation on the Association of German Composers, an organisation always close to his father’s heart. At the age of eighteen he volunteered for military service in 1915, but was rejected – to his parent’s great relief – on health grounds.

In 1923 Franz Strauss became engaged to Alice von Grab-Hermannswörth. The two families had met in 1907 at a performance of Salome in Prague, where the Jewish industrialist Emanuel von Grab owned textile factories. The wedding took place in Vienna in January 1924. Richard Strauss composed the Hochzeitspräludium for two harmony instruments, for which he used motives from Domestica, Guntram and Rosenkavalier.
With Alice, his modest but highly intelligent daughter-in-law the "family business” was enriched not only by a beloved person but also by a valuable staff member. In no time at all she made herself indispensable as secretary to Richard Strauss. Her father-in-law once said to her, "You know, Alice, we two are the only ones in the house who do any work.” She was particularly useful during the difficult war years rescuing the archive and numerous items of value from the threat of confiscation or destruction, and moved them from Vienna to Garmisch. She looked after the priceless estate after the master’s passing until her own death in 1991.

In 1927 Franz and Alice’s first son Richard (Max Emanuel Hermann) was born in Vienna, where they lived in a villa in Jaquingasse. And in 1932 the second grandson of the composer, (Franz Adolf) Christian was born.

During the Nazi era Richard Strauss protected his son’s Jewish relatives as best as he could and enabled his grandchildren to attend school in Vienna. His grandchildren’s education was one of his main concerns. Close to the end of the war he wrote copies of some of his scores for the boys as "Christmas presents of value”.

While Christian, his younger grandson, became a doctor, Richard, an opera director, devoted himself to the preservation and management of his grandfather’s work. His second wife was Hans Hotter’s daughter, Gabriele. She not only brought a "genetic” love and knowledge of Richard Strauss’ work, but, as a librarian, made a valuable contribution to the recording and publication of the archives as well.