Opera, Singspiel – Sheet Music Editions

Music for the theatre forms an extensive part of the Carus catalog, in particular sacred, but also secular Singspiels and musicals for children and young people. There is also a range of important works for the classical operatic stage, available with complete performance material. Johann Adolf Hasse's large-scale opera seria Cleofide, premiered in 1731 in Dresden, marked the beginning of the composer's association with the Saxon court which lasted over 30 years. Ignaz Holzbauer's one-act opera Der Tod der Dido (La morte di Didone) was the first work which was specially composed for the Mannheim Nationaltheater; performed in 1779 in Italian, the composer added German text to the work a year later. Holzbauer's opera was written between two Singspiels by Mozart. In 1768 the twelve-year-old composed his Singspiel Bastien und Bastienne KV 50, based on Rousseau's pastoral comedy Le devin du village; in 1786 the “Schauspiel mit Arien” (play with arias) Der Schauspieldirektor KV486 was staged (as a German-language counterpart, with Salieri's buffa parody “Prima la musica, poi le parole”). Josef Gabriel Rheinberger's first operatic venture Die sieben Raben op. 20 (after the tale of the same name by the Grimm brothers) was premiered in 1869 at the Munich Court Theater (his comic opera Türmers Töchterlein op. 70 followed in 1873). Ulrich Plenzdorf's novel “Paul und Paula”, a 1970s love story from the GDR, inspired Ludger Vollmer to compose his opera of the same name, which falls somewhere between an opera and a musical (premiere, Nordhausen 2004).