Strauss saw the Lachmann version of the play in Max Reinhardt's production at the Kleines Theater in Berlin on 15 November 1902,[2] and immediately set to work on an opera.

[3] Strauss pared down Lachmann's German text to what he saw as its essentials, and in the process reduced it by nearly half, which included removing some of Wilde's recurring motifs.

In 1907, Strauss made an alternate version in French, working with the musicologist Romain Rolland with the objective of retaining as much of the Wilde original as possible, a procedure which also required alterations to the musical score.

[2] This French version was used by Mary Garden, the world's most famous proponent of the role, when she sang the opera in New York, Chicago, Milwaukee, Paris, and other cities.

The French version is much less well known today, although it was revived in Lyon in 1990,[4] and recorded by Kent Nagano with Karen Huffstodt in the title role and José van Dam as Jochanaan.

The combination of the Christian biblical theme, the erotic and the murderous, which so attracted Wilde to the tale, shocked opera audiences from its first appearance.

The Austrian premiere was given at the Graz Opera in 1906 under the composer, with Arnold Schoenberg, Giacomo Puccini, Alban Berg, and Gustav Mahler in the audience.

[8] These patrons entreated the visiting Edward Elgar to lead the objections to the work, but he refused point-blank, stating that Strauss was "the greatest genius of the age".

[11] Mary Garden's performance of the French version of Salome took place at the Oscar Hammerstein Opera in New York in 1909, in direct competition with the Met.

[2] In 1930, Strauss took part in a festival of his music at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, and conducted Salome on 5 November in a version with a slightly reduced orchestration (dictated by the size of the pit).

Narraboth gazes from a terrace in Herod's palace into the banquet hall at the beautiful Princess Salome; he is in love with her, and apotheosizes her, much to the disgusted fearfulness of the Page of Herodias.

The voice of the Prophet Jochanaan is heard from his prison in the palace cistern; Herod fears him and has ordered that no one should contact him, including Jerusalem's High Priest.

Jochanaan emerges from the cistern and shouts prophecies regarding Herod and Herodias that no one understands, except Salome when the Prophet refers to her mother.

Two Nazarenes tell of Christ's miracles; at one point they bring up the raising of Jairus' daughter from the dead, which Herod finds frightening.

Strauss edited the opera's libretto, in the process cutting almost half of Wilde's play, stripping it down and emphasizing its basic dramatic structure.

The structural form of the libretto is highly patterned, notably in the use of symmetry and the hierarchical grouping of events, passages, and sections in threes.

[3] In the final scene of the opera, after Salome kisses Jochanaan's severed head, the music builds to a dramatic climax, which ends with a cadence involving a very dissonant unorthodox chord one measure before rehearsal 361.

It has been called "the most sickening chord in all opera", an "epoch-making dissonance with which Strauss takes Salome...to the depth of degradation", and "the quintessence of Decadence: here is ecstasy falling in upon itself, crumbling into the abyss".

Not only is the chord shockingly dissonant, especially in its musical context and rich orchestration, it has broader significance due in part to Strauss's careful use of keys and leitmotifs to symbolize the opera's characters, emotions such as desire, lust, revulsion, and horror, as well as doom and death.

[19] The vocal demands of the title-role are the same as those of an Isolde, Brünnhilde, or Turandot, in that, ideally, the role requires the volume, stamina, and power of a true dramatic soprano.

Nevertheless, Maria Cebotari, Ljuba Welitsch, Birgit Nilsson, Leonie Rysanek, Éva Marton, Radmila Bakočević, Montserrat Caballé, Anja Silja, Phyllis Curtin, Karan Armstrong, Nancy Shade, Dame Gwyneth Jones, Catherine Malfitano, Hildegard Behrens, Maria Ewing, Teresa Stratas (only in a film version, not on stage), Olive Fremstad, Brenda Lewis, Karita Mattila, Nina Stemme, Patricia Racette, Malin Byström, Elza van den Heever, Elena Stikhina, Asmik Grigorian, Lise Davidsen and Sylvia Sass are among the most memorable who have tackled the role in the last half-century.

In addition to the vocal and physical demands, the role also calls for the agility and gracefulness of a prima ballerina when performing the opera's famous "Dance of the Seven Veils".

Due to the complexity of the role's demands, some of its performers have had a purely vocal focus by opting to leave the dancing to stand-ins who are professional dancers.

The English composer Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji wrote in 1947 a piano transcription of the closing scene of the opera, entitled "Schluß-Szene aus Salome von Richard Strauss—Konzertmäßige Übertragung für Klavier zu zwei Händen" ("Final Scene from Salome by Richard Strauss – Concert Transcription arranged for Piano, two hands").