Which German-born French composer left his most famous opera 'Tales of Hoffmann' unfinished at his death in 1880?
E. T. A. Hoffmann E. T. A. Hoffmann Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann (commonly abbreviated as E. T. A. Hoffmann; born Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann; 24 January 177625 June 1822) was a German Romantic author of fantasy and Gothic horror, a jurist, composer, music critic, draftsman and caricaturist. His stories form the basis of Jacques Offenbach's famous opera "The Tales of Hoffmann", in which Hoffmann appears (heavily fictionalized) as the hero. He is also the author of the novella "The Nutcracker and the Mouse King", on which Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet "The Nutcracker" is based. The ballet "Coppélia" is based on two other stories that
Opera in German One of the most famous German Romantic authors, E.T.A. Hoffmann, was also a music theorist and a composer in his own right and in 1816 he produced an opera, "Undine", in Berlin. Another important early Romantic opera was "Faust" by Louis Spohr (also 1816). Both Hoffmann and Spohr took the basic form of the "Singspiel" as their starting point but began to group the individual numbers into extended scenes. They also employed "reminiscence motifs", recurring musical themes associated with characters or concepts in the opera, which would pave the way for Wagner's use of the leitmotif. The major breakthrough in