Die Verurteilung des Lukullus (The Condemnation of Lucullus) is a opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

 by Paul Dessau

Paul Dessau

Paul Dessau was a German composer and conductor.- Biography :Dessau was born in Hamburg into a musical family...

 to a libretto by the German dramatist Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht

Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...

.

Brecht's dramatic text for the opera is more or less identical to that of the radio-play The Trial of Lucullus, which was written in 1938-9.

Performance history

The opera was first performed under the latter's title at the Berlin Staatsoper

Berlin State Opera

The Staatsoper Unter den Linden is a German opera company. Its permanent home is the opera house on the Unter den Linden boulevard in the Mitte district of Berlin, which also hosts the Staatskapelle Berlin orchestra.-Early years:...

 on the 17th March, 1951, conducted by Hermann Scherchen

Hermann Scherchen

Hermann Scherchen was a German conductor.-Life:Scherchen was originally a violist and played among the violas of the Bluthner Orchestra of Berlin while still in his teens...

, with stage design by Caspar Neher

Caspar Neher

Caspar Neher was an Austrian-German scenographer and librettist, known principally for his career-long working relationship with Bertolt Brecht.Neher was born in Augsburg...

. It was withdrawn, revised, and reinstated with its present title on the 12th October, 1951.

The opera was broadcast on the radio in an English-language translation by the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

's Third Programme

BBC Third Programme

The BBC Third Programme was a national radio network broadcast by the BBC. The network first went on air on 29 September 1946 and became one of the leading cultural and intellectual forces in Britain, playing a crucial role in disseminating the arts...

 on the 20th March, 1953.

Roles

• The fishwife (contralto
  Contralto
  Contralto is the deepest female classical singing voice, with the lowest tessitura, falling between tenor and mezzo-soprano. It typically ranges between the F below middle C to the second G above middle C , although at the extremes some voices can reach the E below middle C or the second B above...
  
  )
• The farmer (bass)
• The baker (tenor
  Tenor
  The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
  
  )
• The cherrytree bearer (baritone
  Baritone
  Baritone is a type of male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek , meaning deep sounding, music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C Baritone (or...
  
  )
• The king (bass)
• The teacher (tenor)
• The dead judge (bass)
• The courtesan (mezzo-soprano
  Mezzo-soprano
  A mezzo-soprano is a type of classical female singing voice whose range lies between the soprano and the contralto singing voices, usually extending from the A below middle C to the A two octaves above...
  
  )
• The queen (soprano)
• Lasus (tenor)
• Lukullus (tenor)
• Tertullia (mezzo-soprano)