Héléna (opera) Héléna (opera) Héléna is an opera in three acts by the French composer Étienne Méhul. It premiered at the Opéra-Comique, Paris on 1 March 1803. The libretto is by Jean-Nicolas Bouilly. It enjoyed 36 performances in the space of 20 months before disappearing from the theatre's repertoire. Bouilly was accused of basing the plot too closely on Cherubini's "Les deux journées". According to the musicologist Elizabeth Bartlet, "several scholars have pointed out [that] Beethoven's trumpet call in "Fidelio" was inspired by Méhul's "Héléna"". Constantin, Count of Arles, has been accused of killing his father. He flees with his wife Héléna
Tarquin (opera) Tarquin (opera) Tarquin is a chamber opera by Ernst Krenek to an English libretto by Emmet Lavery. Written in 1940, it is Krenek's only unpublished opera (Op. 90), though a premiere in German translation (by M.-C. Schulte-Strathaus & P. Funk rather than the composer) took place in 1950 in Cologne. Krenek, who was in Switzerland at the time of the Anschluss, escaped to exile in the USA and a teaching position at Vassar College, where Lavery (1902–86) was a newspaper editor in neighboring Poughkeepsie (he would later run for Congress and write for Hollywood). The piece was designed for college