Weber's Oberon Gets Proms Premiere 200 Years Late — SkimNews
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- Weber's Oberon receives its Proms premiere 200 years after its 1826 Covent Garden premiere, performed by the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique and Monteverdi Choir in a semi-staged production narrated by Tamsin Greig.
- Timothy Knapman has rewritten the James Robinson Planché libretto into a single new narrative, because the original 1826 text — which Grove's Dictionary of Music describes as "a picaresque farrago of nonsense" — would not land with modern audiences.
- Carl Maria von Weber died of tuberculosis aged 39 shortly after the 1826 premiere and was buried in London; 18 years later Wagner raised money to repatriate his body to Dresden, composing a wind-band fantasia on themes from Euryanthe for the second funeral.
- Tenor John Findon sings the heldentenor role of Sir Huon, while the Monteverdi Choir covers fairies, elves, slaves, courtiers and mermaids across the semi-staged production.
- The Oberon overture was a 1902 Proms staple played six times in a single season, while the full opera has had to wait until now — two centuries after composition — for its Proms debut.
- The conductor highlights Reiza's act two showstopper Ocean, Thou Mighty Monster and the act one finale, where a march representing the harem guard closes in as Reiza and her servant Fatima plot their escape.
Why it matters: The premiere gives Weber's music a rare full-length English-language showcase at the BBC Proms, one of classical music's most visible platforms, and the Knapman rewrite is the mechanism by which a 200-year-old opera is being made to work for contemporary audiences without touching Weber's score.
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