Four Last Songs

posth., for soprano and orchestra are – with the exception of the song "Malven" (Mallows), composed later the same year – the final completed works of Richard Strauss.

The songs are "Frühling" (Spring), "September", "Beim Schlafengehen [de]" (When Falling Asleep) and "Im Abendrot" (At Sunset).

The premiere was given at the Royal Albert Hall in London on 22 May 1950 by soprano Kirsten Flagstad and the Philharmonia Orchestra, conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler.

Although most recordings adhere to Roth, some stay with Flagstad/Furtwängler – Beim Schlafengehen, September, Frühling, Im Abendrot.

The settings are for a solo soprano voice given soaring melodies against a full orchestra, and all four songs have prominent horn parts.

Towards the end of "Im Abendrot", after the soprano's intonation of "Ist dies etwa der Tod?"

"), Strauss musically quotes his own tone poem Death and Transfiguration, written 60 years earlier.

[7] The songs are scored for piccolo, 3 flutes (3rd doubling on 2nd piccolo), 2 oboes, English horn, 2 clarinets in B-flat and A, bass clarinet, 3 bassoons (3rd doubling on contrabassoon), 4 horns in F (also E-flat and D), 3 trumpets in C, E-flat and F, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, harp, celesta, and strings.

"[8] The premiere was given posthumously at the Royal Albert Hall in London on 22 May 1950, sung by Flagstad, accompanied by the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler.

Subsequent restorations using modern digital technology were effected in 2007 by Roger Beardsley for Testament Records,[9] and in 2014 by Andrew Rose for Pristine Audio.

for piano and voice in 1894 from a poem by Karl Friedrich Henckell, but did not orchestrate it until 1948, just after he had completed "Im Abendrot" and before he composed the other three of his Four Last Songs.