❦  The Encyclopedia of Classic Opera
Opera·Almanac
Opera in the Repertoire · Romantic

Faust

Music by Charles Gounod · libretto by Jules Barbier · premiered 1859 · at Theatre Lyrique

Faust is a grand opera in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré from Carré's play Faust et Marguerite, in turn loosely based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Part One. It debuted at the Théâtre Lyrique on the Boulevard du Temple in Paris on 19 March 1859, with influential sets designed by Charles-Antoine Cambon and Joseph Thierry, Jean Émile Daran, Édouard Desplechin, and Philippe Chaperon.

Text from the Wikipedia article "Faust (opera)", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the Composer

Charles-François Gounod (UK: GOO-noh, US: goo-NOH, French: [ʃaʁl fʁɑ̃swa ɡuno]; 17 June 1818 – 18 October 1893) was a French composer. He wrote twelve operas, of which the most popular has always been Faust (1859); his Roméo et Juliette (1867) also remains in the international repertoire. He composed a large amount of church music, many songs, and popular short pieces including his "Ave Maria" (an elaboration of a Bach piece) and "Funeral March of a Marionette". Born in Paris into an artistic and musical family, Gounod was a student at the Conservatoire de Paris and won France's most prestigious musical prize, the Prix de Rome. His studies took him to Italy, Austria and then Prussia, where…

Text from the Wikipedia article "Charles Gounod", licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Read the full biography →

Other Operas by Charles Gounod