Orpheus in the Underworld Orpheus in the Underworld Orphée aux enfers, whose title translates from the French as Orpheus in the Underworld, is an opéra bouffon (a form of operetta), or opéra féerie in its revised version. Its score was composed by Jacques Offenbach to a French text written by Ludovic Halévy and later revised by Hector-Jonathan Crémieux. The work, first performed in 1858, is said to be the first classical full-length operetta. Offenbach's earlier operettas were small-scale one-act works, since the law in France did not allow full-length works of certain genres. "Orpheus" was not only longer, but more musically adventurous than Offenbach's
Orpheus Britannicus step, from C to D. Henry Hall, who had studied composition with Purcell under John Blow, wrote the dedicatory poems at the beginning of each volume, (1698 and 1702) and also wrote one for Blow's "Amphion Anglicus". The later 1706 London printing of "Orpheus Britannicus" by William Pearson utilized a new style of music printing to great success, where the notehead was in one piece with the background staff. John Blow's "Amphion Anglicus" (1700), a collection of Blow's songs, excerpts from odes, and chamber music, was published by subscription, after "Orpheus Britannicus"' success, and even shows a certain symmetry in