The current volume of the edition of the Critical Edition of Richard Strauss Works gives us an insight into this world of a composer’s early life and works.

The chamber music works for one string instrument and piano (violin/piano and violoncello/piano) composed by the young musician between the ages of fifteen and twenty-three are published in this volume which is augmented with and contrasted by a very brief ‘off-the-cuff exercise’, an Allegretto written by the eighty-four-year-old Strauss...