Johann Strauss the Younger, the most
famous and enduringly successful of
nineteenth-century light-music composers,
was born in Vienna on 25 October 1825.
His father, Johann Strauss the Elder, was
by that time well on his way to becoming
Europe's uncrowned king of dance music;
indeed, it was only with Strauss senior's
untimely death in 1849 that the younger man could advance his own
musical standing in his native Vienna.

Building upon the firm musical foundations laid by his father
(1804-49) and Joseph Lanner (1801-43), Johann II (along with his
brothers Josef and Eduard) developed the classical Viennese Waltz to
the point where it became as much a feature of the concert hall as the
dance floor. With his abundantly tuneful waltzes, polkas, quadrilles
and marches, Johann II captivated not only Vienna but also the whole
of Europe and America for more than half a century.

The thrice-married 'Waltz King' was persuaded to
compose operetta, not by Offenbach (as often
stated), but by his first wife, the singer Jetty
Treffz. Strauss completed sixteen stage works, of
which Die Fledermaus (1874) and The Gypsy Baron (1885) remain
the most popular, besides more than five hundred orchestral
compositions - including the most famous of all waltzes, The Blue
Danube (1867). Johann Strauss II died in Vienna on 3 June 1899.