Orpheus in the Underworld

Orpheus in the Underworld, comic operetta by French composer Jacques Offenbach (French libretto by Hector Crémieux and Ludovic Halévy), a satirical treatment of the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus. It premiered on October 21, 1858, at the Théâtre des Bouffes-Parisiens in Paris. The work’s best-known music is the cancan that appears in the overture and the final scene. The work was originally structured in two acts, though Offenbach later expanded it into four acts.

Background and context

The classic story of Orpheus concerns a renowned musician who is so distraught over the death of his wife, Eurydice, that he attempts to rescue her from the Underworld, the place of the dead. This tragic tale was adapted for opera by many composers, including Claudio Monteverdi (written and first performed 1607), Christoph Gluck (first performed 1762, later revised), and Joseph Haydn (written 1791, first performed 1951).

Unlike the other composers, Offenbach gave the story a farcical twist. In his version Orpheus and Eurydice, though married to each other, are amicably living separate lives, each blissfully occupied with a new lover. Like Eurydice in the original Greek story, Offenbach’s heroine is fatally bitten by a snake, but, rather than dying tragically, she willingly relocates to the Underworld to be with Pluto—the ruler of the Underworld—who in a mortal form had become her lover while she was alive. In Offenbach’s version Orpheus acts to retrieve Eurydice much against his will. Both he and Eurydice are pleased when his attempt fails. Offenbach was equally irreverent in terms of music, pairing courtly minuets with high-kicking cancans and quoting satirically from Gluck’s earlier opera.

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When Offenbach’s opera premiered, critics expressed shock, both because it mocked Gluck’s revered telling of the tale and because it dismissed the idea of the perfection of ancient Greece. Audiences, however, loved it, and within a few years Orpheus in the Underworld became an international success. So marked was the opera’s fame, and so lasting, that in 1886 Camille Saint-Saëns satirized the satire by quoting the finale’s cancan at a much slower tempo and assigning it to tortoises in The Carnival of the Animals (1886).

Of the famed overture, it should be noted that at the time of the operetta’s Parisian premiere, there was no full overture, only a brief prelude. The French preferred their operas that way. Once Offenbach’s work achieved international fame, a more substantial overture was demanded, particularly by German theatres. So an overture was provided, one that made prominent use of the operetta’s best music, most obviously the concluding cancan. The overture rapidly gained popularity on its own account, and it remains a favourite piece for orchestral pops concerts.

Main cast and vocal parts

• Eurydice, wife of Orpheus (soprano)
• Pluto, god of the Underworld and Eurydice’s lover (tenor)
• Juno, wife of Jupiter (soprano)
• Jupiter, father of the gods (baritone)
• Public Opinion (mezzo-soprano)
• John Styx, servant of Pluto (tenor)
• Orpheus, a musician and husband of Eurydice (tenor)

Setting and story summary

Orpheus in the Underworld is set in ancient Greece, on Mount Olympus, and in the Underworld.

Act I

The house of Orpheus and Eurydice in the countryside near Thebes.

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Public Opinion sets the scene for the ensuing drama: Eurydice is dissatisfied. Her husband, Orpheus, is obsessed with music, and she wishes to have a more attentive admirer. In fact, she has already taken a new lover, the shepherd Aristaeus (the mortal disguise of the god Pluto, ruler of the Underworld). When she is mortally wounded, Pluto reveals himself, and the two go happily off to the Underworld. Orpheus is pleased with the outcome. Unfortunately for him, Public Opinion declares that decency requires the reluctant Orpheus to retrieve his wife.