Lyric Opera 2024-2025 Issue 2 - Fidelio

25 | Lyric Opera of Chicago Fidelio , Beethoven’s only opera, is an opera like no other. A drama of ideas that makes deeply moving theater out of abstractions, it never ceases to move audiences—especially, perhaps, in times of political tumult—with its vision of freedom secured through struggle, love, and hope. Originally titled Leonore: or The Triumph of Conjugal Love , it is ultimately based on a French libretto by Jean-Nicolas Bouilly, which had been set as an opera by two other composers before Beethoven; it was prepared for his purposes by Joseph Sonnleithner. Its original premiere was in 1805, but revisions were made by Beethoven’s friend Stephan von Breuning in 1806, shortening the opera from three to two acts. After further revisions to the libretto by Georg Friedrich Treitschke, along with many revisions to the musical score, the opera opened again in 1814. Although the earlier versions exist and have their defenders, it is almost always the 1814 version (by convention the only one called Fidelio ) that we hear today. Beethoven wrote four overtures for the opera. The one standardly played today is the brief overture known as the Fidelio Overture . The larger symphonic works known today as Leonore no. 2 and Leonore no. 3 are usually thought too lengthy for overture performance. Beethoven’s Fidelio : Reaching Toward the Light by Martha Nussbaum Corey Weaver / San Francisco Opera In Lyric’s production of Fidelio ,the drama unfolds in a modern detention facility.