Fantasio (Maag/Berger version)

Libretto by Paul de Musset and Charles Nuitter, based on the comedy by Alfred de Musset; new German version by Otto Maag and Ludwig Berger (G)

colS,M,4T,Bar,BBar,2B; chorus;
2.2.2.2-4.2.3.0-timp.perc-strings

For Offenbach, romantic opera was the big dream in his life: away from lyrical drama, the Singspiel, which seemed much too light for him, away from operetta, which he mastered as a champion of light entertainment, to the purer realm of absolute music. In the music of Fantasio, considered one of his most beautiful and refined works by those who know Offenbach, there is a shade of that longing. Fantasio, which remains close to a drama by Alfred de Musset, marks Offenbach’s crucial step on his way towards Tales of Hoffmann.
Ludwig Berger

Comic, Poetic, Romantic