Josef Strauss - Benedek-Marsch, Op.199 (1866)

Josef Luckhardt Strauss (20 August 1827 – 22 July 1870) was an Austrian composer. He was the brother of Johann Strauss II and Eduard Strauss. His father wanted him to choose a career in the Austrian Habsburg military. He studied music with Franz Dolleschal and learned to play the violin with Franz Anton Ries.

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Benedek-Marsch in E-flat major, Op.199 (1866)

Wiener Philharmoniker conducted by Willy Bovskovsky

The March seems to have been dedicated to Ludwig August Ritter von Benedek (14 July 1804 – 27 April 1881), also known as Lajos Benedek, with the Hungarian form of Ludwig, was an Austro-Hungarian general (Feldzeugmeister), best known for commanding the imperial army in 1866 in their defeat at the Battle of Königgrätz against the Prussian Army, which ended his career.

There was extensive demand for the blame for the defeat to be placed on Benedek. He resigned as commander-in-chief at Pozsony (Bratislava) on 26 July 1866. The highest military law senate imposed a court martial against him and was to investigate of the battle. This was stopped by the instruction of the emperor.

Benedek was ordered never to speak about the circumstances of the defeat. When a scathing article in the Wiener Zeitung on 8 December 1866 blamed him alone for the catastrophe, he had no right to reply.

The former first soldier of the Empire lived for another fifteen years in quiet retirement at Graz and died there on 27 April 1881.

Josef Strauss wrote 283 works with opus numbers. He wrote many waltzes, including: Sphären-Klänge (Music of the Spheres), Delirien (Deliriums), Transaktionen (Transactions), Mein Lebenslauf ist Lieb' und Lust (My Character is Love and Joy), and Dorfschwalben aus Österreich (Village Swallows from Austria), polkas, most famously the Pizzicato Polka [It] with his brother Johann, quadrilles, and other dance music, and also some marches. The waltz The Mysterious Powers of Magnetism (Dynamiden) with the use of minor keys showed a quality that distinguished his waltzes from those of his more popular elder brother. The polka-mazurka shows influence by J. Strauss II, where he wrote many examples like Die Emancipierte and Die Libelle.

Josef Strauss was sick most of his later life. He was prone to fainting spells and intense headaches. During a tour in 1870, he fell unconscious from the conductor's podium in Warsaw while conducting his 'Musical Potpourri', striking his head. His wife brought him back home to Vienna, to the Hirschenhaus, where he died on 22 July of that year. A final diagnosis cited only decomposed blood. There were rumors that he had been beaten by drunken Russian soldiers after allegedly refusing to perform for them one night. A specific cause of death was not determined, since his widow forbade any autopsy. Originally buried in the St. Marx Cemetery, Strauss was later exhumed and reburied in the Vienna Central Cemetery, alongside his mother Anna.