Hansel and Gretel (opera) Hansel and Gretel (opera) Hansel and Gretel (German: ) is an opera by nineteenth-century composer Engelbert Humperdinck, who described it as a "" (fairy-tale opera). The libretto was written by Humperdinck's sister, Adelheid Wette, based on the Grimm brothers' fairy tale "Hansel and Gretel". It is much admired for its folk music-inspired themes, one of the most famous being the "" ("Evening Benediction") from act 2. The idea for the opera was proposed to Humperdinck by his sister, who approached him about writing music for songs that she had written for her children for Christmas based on "Hansel and Gretel".
Jacobowsky und der Oberst (opera) Jacobowsky und der Oberst (opera) Jacobowsky und der Oberst, Op. 49, ("Jacobovsky and the Colonel") is an opera in four acts by Giselher Klebe who also wrote the libretto based on the 1944 play of the by Franz Werfel. It premiered on 2 November 1965 at the Hamburg State Opera which had commissioned the work. Klebe dedicated it to the then director of the Staatsoper, Rolf Liebermann. Time and place: 1940, Paris, St. Cyrill, Bayonne and Saint-Jean-de-Luz The first American performance was on 27 June 1967 at the Metropolitan Opera, New York, using the same cast, conducted by Matthias Kuntzsch.