E.T.A. HOFFMANN Undine / Roland Bader | Deutsche Grammophon

Recorded on our partner label Koch Schwann, we release an album that features a 1982 recording of E. T. A. Hoffmann’s Undine opera, which celebrates his 250th birthday anniversary. 

Few people today know that E. T. A. Hoffmann (1776–1822) — the famous Romantic poet who inspired Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker and was himself the subject of an opera by Jacques Offenbach — was also a distinguished opera composer. His opera Undine, which premiered in Berlin in 1816, went down in music history as the first German Romantic opera. The libretto, telling the tale of the tragic love between a beautiful water nymph and a faithless knight, was written by Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué, based on his fairy-tale novella of the same name. The story would later inspire both Andersen’s The Little Mermaid and Dvořák’s Rusalka. 

The album features a first-rate cast: Krisztina Laki shines in the title role, alongside Roland Hermann as the knight Huldbrand von Ringstetten and Karl Ridderbusch as the water sprite Kühleborn. The choir of St Hedwig’s Cathedral in Berlin and the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Roland Bader, evoke a sunken, romantic world of magic. 

The album is released digitally for the first time. 

Read the full synopsis (PDF).