Alceste
Music by Anton Schweitzer · libretto by Christoph Martin Wieland · premiered 1773 · at Nationaltheater Weimar
Alceste is an opera in German in five acts by Anton Schweitzer with a libretto by Christoph Martin Wieland. It was commissioned by Abel Seyler for the Seylersche Schauspiel-Gesellschaft, and premiered on 28 May 1773 at the Hoftheater Weimar. Considered a milestone of German opera, it was revived in Weimar and recorded in 1999.
Text from the Wikipedia article "Alceste (Schweitzer)", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
About the Composer
Anton Schweitzer (6 June 1735 in Coburg – 23 November 1787 in Gotha) was a German composer of operas, who was affiliated with Abel Seyler's theatrical company. He was a child prodigy who obtained the patronage of the duke of Saxe-Hildburghausen, who sent him to study with Jakob Friedrich Kleinknecht at the court of Bayreuth in 1758, and then sent him to Italy (1764–66), and made him Kapellmeister. With the dismissal of the court orchestra at Hildburghausen, he was enabled to tour Europe with the Seyler theatrical company from 1769. His most notable work is the opera Alceste (1773), with a German libretto by Christoph Martin Wieland, among the early German-language operas.
Text from the Wikipedia article "Anton Schweitzer", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.