The Barber of Baghdad by Cornelius, L 10 juuni 2017, Alates (2017/2017), Dirigent Johannes Pell, Oper Wuppertal, Wuppertal, Germany

"I'm an academic, doctor and chemist ... linguist and lawyer and tourist and purist ... painter and sculptor, fencer, gymnast ... I'm an athletic, deeply theoretical, exemplary practical, self-taught genius!" - This is how the barber from Baghdad will introduce himself to the enamored Nurredin , before shaving him for the longed-for tryst with his mistress. In addition, the barber is something else that he doesn't mention: namely, stubborn. His well-intentioned intervention at the meeting later calls first all the servants, then all the residents of Baghdad, then the judge and finally the caliph - only to find that the supposedly stolen "treasure" in the box, which is the subject of the dispute, the passed out lover of the daughter of the house is... Peter Cornelius writes his opera unmistakably in the tradition of Richard Wagner's great music dramas and especially his ›Meistersinger‹: Like Wagner, he writes the libretto himself (about an episode from the fairy tale collection ›One Thousand and One Nights‹). Then, with a large orchestra, instead of Wagner's dreamed-of Middle Ages, he conjures up an equally dreamed-up Orient and, like his role model, uses motifs from memory to closely interlock the plot musically as well. But instead of copying the Bayreuth master, Cornelius succeeds in creating a brilliant musical comedy of his very own character with his opera, premiered by Franz Liszt in 1858.