Christoph W. Gluck, Orpheus and Eurydice / "Dance of the Blessed Spirits"

Although he enjoyed wide recognition during his lifetime as a composer of operas and music for the stage, the German composer Christoph Willibald Gluck, born in Erasbach in 1714, is today practically unknown to the "general public". His works are rarely performed, although he is recognized as the great reformer of the operatic genre, advocating and establishing a new balance between music and drama. Away from the Italian model, prodigal in fiorituras and chilling warbles, Gluck abolished forever the strict distinction between recitatives and arias, endowing the music with the ability to maintain an uninterrupted flow of dramatic action.

The first elements of reform were manifested in his work Orpheus and Eurydice, of 1762, although it was only completed when the work was translated into French in 1774 (dedicated, incidentally, to Marie Antoinette), with the replacement of the castrato by a tenor in the role of Orpheus, among other important modifications.

As was customary for the time – and particularly for Gluck –  the work draws on Greek mythology, recreating the myth of Orpheus, which, in a nutshell, goes as follows, although, to please the Viennese public, in its time the work featured a happy ending.

The myth of Orpheus

Christoph W. Gluck (1714 - 1787)

The shepherd Orpheus, from Thrace, played the lyre in a sublime way, so it was easy for him to enchant with his music his beloved Eurydice who, to Orpheus' misfortune, would soon die from the bite of a snake. Tormented by grief, the shepherd, son of a muse and a god, managed to reach Hades, the place of the dead, to which end he had to enchant with his music the canine Cerberus, the three-headed dog in charge of guarding the gates of the world of shadows. Once inside, he humbly asked the king and queen of the dead to allow him to return with Eurydice to the world of the living. 

The tragedy
As he accompanied the request with the singing of his lyre, he quickly obtained consent, but on one condition: he would return to the world of light, holding Eurydice by the hand, but never turning his head back. So he did, until he was seized with the doubt that he had been deceived. And then he turned around, only to see Eurydice disappear before his eyes, her arms outstretched.

Dance of the Blessed Spirits

In three acts, the opera had its premiere at the Burgtheater in Vienna on October 5, 1762, on the occasion of Emperor Franz I's holy day. A short ballet accompanying the second scene of Act II in the original version became a dance in the French version of 1774, in four movements, containing a beautiful flute solo, the Dance of the Blessed Spirits, presented here in an orchestral version (audio only) by the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Andras Korodi.