Fidelio

Fidelio is Ludwig van Beethoven's only opera, which took him ten years to complete and was revised several times. It is regarded as one of the archetypal operas on the theme of liberty. Leonore, the main female character, is one of the great operatic heroines, disguising herself as a man and infiltrating a prison to free her wrongfully imprisoned husband, Florestan. Despite frequent attempts by commentators to use the opera and its protagonists for partisan purposes, the work continues to defy simple black-and-white interpretations. Beethoven's music has a universal, idealistic, humanist appeal that defies categorical categorization.

With Fidelio, Beethoven pulled off the first-ever specifically German opera. His fusion of rescue opera, humanist oratorio, and melodrama became a model for what a German romantic opera could be.

In German language with German and English surtitles.