Peer Gynt (opera)

Peer Gynt is a 1938 opera by Werner Egk to a libretto after the play Peer Gynt by Henrik Ibsen. The premiere took place on 24 November 1938 at the Berlin State Opera where Egk was the conductor at the time.^[1]

The opera was controversial in the Nazi press. This criticism was quashed when Adolf Hitler, an attendee at the performance, allegedly approved of the work.^[2] Despite Stravinsky-like music, the premiere met the approval of Joseph Goebbels and Adolf Hitler, although Hermann Göring raged against it, and that approval has since tainted both the opera and composer.^[3] The opera was performed in seven German cities until 1944 and even in Czech in Prague and in Paris.^[4]