Orpheus and Eurydice

Orpheus and Eurydice is an opera by 18th Century German composer Christoph Willibald Gluck and stands as his most popular work, as well as a tremendous influence upon the development of German opera. Despite the opera's rather conventional story, which is based upon the age old myth of Orpheus and his journey to reclaim his deceased wife Eurydice from Hades, Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice is the first of his so-called "reform" operas that would go on to tremendously simplify the notoriously convoluted plots and musical structures that were common to German opera at the time. The opera is also one of Gluck's most recorded works, if not one of the most recorded operas from the period, with over seven versions of the work (of which many showcase Orpheus in various vocal ranges and genders) created over the last three centuries still being performed in equal measure to this day.