As we look back on Strauss’s long and prodigious career, it might all seem to be the inevitable product of superlative technique and talent – so much so that we might overlook the people who contributed to Strauss’s career and legacy from his days as a child prodigy to the recording studio decades after his death. This chapter takes stock of a wide range of figures who helped to set Strauss along his professional path, including aunts, uncles, and other extended family, his father Franz, the conductors Hans von Bülow, Franz Wüllner, Ernst von Schuch, Gustav Mahler, Franz Schalk, Hans Knappertsbusch, Karl Böhm, and Clemens Krauss, and singers Maria Jeritza, Lotte Lehman, Richard Mayr, Anna Bahr-Mildenburg, Marie Gutheil-Schoder, and Elisabeth Schumann. In various ways, some direct and others indirect, these champions contributed to the success and legacy of one of Germany’s most enduring composers.