""Psyche’s love and fervent devotion and faithfulness lead her through suffering and death to a higher world and to a higher, purer life; yet, it always tastes of bird, even if only the flapping of wings is heard."" This is what Gade wrote in a letter to the Danish pastor and poet Christian Richardt when he gave him a vocal score for Christmas 1882.

After Niels W. Gade had completed his trilogy of choral works based on central narratives of European cultural history – “The Crusaders” (1866), “Kalanus” (1869), and “Zion” (1874) –, in 1877 he took up another great narrative of the European heritage, the ancient tale of Cupid and Psyche. Both Gade and his first librettist, Carl Andersen, were well acquainted with the subject and its European tradition. After a creative hiatus, however, Gade switched to the German-Danish writer Edmund Lobedanz as text author in 1881, in the course of resuming work on “Psyche”. The German translation generally speaking corresponds to the Danish original, but overall, it is more stringently conceived. The English translation, based on Lobedanz's German text, was undertaken by John Troutbeck with whom Gade had previously worked.

After “Psyche” was premiered at the Birmingham Musical Festival on August 31, 1882, under the composer's direction (with William Stockley's Orchestra and the Birmingham Festival Choral Society), it became a regular hit the following year with numerous English choral societies, which apparently competed with one another to be the first to perform the new work: nine performances are recorded between November 27 and December 20, 1882, including a much-discussed concert on December 12 at St. James' Hall in London with the ambitious Willings Choir and with soloists such as the soprano Marie Roze, who had already sung the part of Psyche at the premiere. In the course of the following year, “Psyche” was performed a total of 27 times in Great Britain, and subsequently 33 more times during Gade's lifetime. In Germany, on the other hand, only four performances were recorded during his life.

When Gade conducted “Psyche” in his native country on November 28, 1890, no one could have guessed that he had barely four weeks to live; he died suddenly on December 21. And so, it seemed a decree of fate that “Psyche”, which strikingly characterizes the artistic ambitions of his later work, became the last work Gade conducted.

- Concert Piece for Soloists, Choir and Orchestra

- Niels W. Gade. Works IV/7