Orpheus und Eurydike Orpheus und Eurydike Orpheus und Eurydike ("Orpheus and Eurydice") is an opera by Ernst Krenek. The German text is based on a play by Oskar Kokoschka. Kokoschka began writing his play during his convalescence (from wounds received on the Ukrainian front in 1915) and it premiered in 1921, one year before Rilke's Sonnets to Orpheus appeared. In 1923 he let it be known that he was looking for a composer to write incidental music. Kokoschka's expressionist, psychological treatment of the Orpheus myth, marked by his passion for Alma Mahler, appealed to Krenek so he approached Kokoschka. They quickly decided that
Orpheus "to change allegiance, status, ownership". Cognates could include Greek ὄρφνη ("órphnē") "darkness", and surely Greek ὀρφανός ("orphanós") "fatherless, orphan", from which comes English "orphan" by way of Latin. Fulgentius, a mythographer of the late 5th to early 6th century AD, gave the unlikely etymology meaning "best voice," "Oraia-phonos". The earliest literary reference to Orpheus is a two-word fragment of the sixth-century BC lyric poet Ibycus: "onomaklyton Orphēn" ("Orpheus famous-of-name"). He is not mentioned in Homer or Hesiod. Most ancient sources accept his historical existence; Aristotle is an exception. Pindar calls Orpheus "the father of songs" and identifies him as a