STRANSKY, JOSEF

STRANSKY, JOSEF (1872–1936), conductor and composer. Born in Humpolec, Bohemia, Stransky studied medicine (receiving his M.D. in Prague, 1896), and music in Leipzig and then in Vienna with Dvořák and Bruckner. Stransky conducted a student orchestra in Prague, and in 1898 had his first professional engagement at the Neues Deutsches Theater there. In 1903 he moved to the Hamburg Opera as principal conductor and in 1910 worked with the Bluethner Orchestra in Berlin. In 1911 he succeeded *Mahler as conductor of the New York Philharmonic Society (to the distress of Strauss, who thought Stransky would give German conducting a bad name abroad). A large bequest (by Joseph Pulitzer) enabled him to carry out successfully the sweeping reforms instituted by Mahler. He pleased his New York audience with his uncontroversial but not altogether unspiced programs. He conducted the première (1922) at the Philharmonic of *Schoenberg's Bach chorale-prelude transcriptions, despite having received a sulphurous letter from Schoenberg. In 1923, he became conductor of the newly formed New York State Symphony Orchestra, but gave up conducting in 1925 to work as an art dealer. Stransky published the book Modern Paintings by German and Austrian Masters (1916); composed an operetta, Der General; songs; orchestral and other instrumental music. His editions include an adaptation of Berlioz's Béatrice et Bénédict, which he felt needed reorchestration for modern taste.

bibliography:

Grove Music Online; Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians (1997); O.G. Villard, "Joseph Stransky Resigns," in: The Nation, 116, no. 3008 (February 28, 1923).

[Naama Ramot (2^nd ed.)]