The libretto for Hector Berlioz's opera Les…
November 1863 CE
The libretto for Hector Berlioz's opera Les Troyens, a French grand opera in five acts, was written by Berlioz himself from Virgil's epic poem the Aeneid; the score was composed between 1856 and 1858.
Les Troyens is Berlioz's most ambitious work, the summation of his entire artistic career, but he will not live to see it performed in its entirety.
Under the title Les Troyens à Carthage, the last three acts are premièred with many cuts by Léon Carvalho's company, the Théâtre Lyrique, at their theater (now the Théâtre de la Ville) on the Place du Châtelet in Paris on November 4, 1863, with twenty-one repeat performances.
After decades of neglect, today the opera is considered by some music critics as one of the finest ever written.