The empress's rider
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| Title: | The empress's rider |
| Shape: | operetta |
| Original language: | German |
| Music: | August Pepöck |
| Libretto : | Robert Nästlberger |
| Literary source: | "The candle maker of St. Stephen" by Alfons von Czibulka |
| Premiere: | April 30, 1941 |
| Place of premiere: | Vienna |
| Place and time of the action: | Vienna and Silesia 1759 |
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Der Reiter der Kaiserin is an operetta in two acts by August Pepöck . The libretto was written by Robert Nästlberger . It is based on motifs from the 1937 novel "Der Kerzlmacher von St. Stephan" by Alfons von Czibulka . It premiered on April 30, 1941 at the Raimund Theater in Vienna .
orchestra
Two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, a harp, a celesta, a guitar, a vibraphone, percussion and strings
action
The operetta is set in Vienna and Silesia in 1759.
first act
Empress Maria Theresa has ordered that her officers are strictly forbidden from entering into a love affair with a middle-class girl, let alone marrying one. This prohibition bothered Lieutenant Christoph von Rabenau, as he is immortally in love with Lisl, the daughter of the candle maker Aloisius Brand. When he is in Brand's shop again, he hands the owner a letter to his lover and chooses a gingerbread heart in which to hide the answer to him. He'll buy this gingerbread heart later.
When Lisl tries to smuggle her message into the gingerbread heart, she is horrified to discover that it has disappeared. She learns that the Empress had it bought to give her daughter for her birthday. Lisl immediately goes to the castle. She has a second gingerbread heart with her to exchange for the burdensome one. Field Marshal Hadik values the Brand family very much and wants to help the girl; but unfortunately the plan fails.
Lisl meets Christoph von Rabenau in the banquet hall. Overjoyed, the two embrace each other and again admit their love. The lieutenant had barely left when Lisl saw the son of the wine merchant Kirndorfer approaching. This, Franzl Kirndorfer, has had an eye on the dashing Maderl for a long time and wants to take the opportunity to hang out with her again. The mutual teasing ends with Lisl kissing her admirer for fun. At that very moment, however, Christoph von Rabenau reappears and involuntarily witnesses the kiss. He misunderstood the game and believes that Lisl was only faking her love for him; in truth she loves another.
In the meantime the empress has learned of the forbidden love of her lieutenant Rabenau through the treacherous gingerbread heart. When the latter assures her that the love affair was just an episode that has now been ticked off, she is satisfied. So that the lieutenant does not relapse, she instructs him to deliver a secret message to the troops stationed in Olomouc. Because she knows that Countess Tersky has been in love with the lieutenant for a long time and that a connection between the two would be convenient for her, the countess is chosen to accompany him.
Second act
On the way to Olomouc, Lautnant von Rabenau and Countess Tersky rest in a rural inn. They are surprised by the enemy Prussian troops. They excuse themselves by pretending to be a middle-class couple who are on their honeymoon. At first the Prussians seem to believe this declaration; But when the countess takes out her handkerchief, on which a count's crown is embroidered, the soldiers know that they have been lied to. Christoph von Rabenau has to go to Silesia in Prussian captivity.
When Lisl learns what happened to her lover, she does everything in her power to save him. She consults with Field Marshal Hadik. He wants to help the likeable girl and recommends that she deliver a letter from him to the Prussian commander in Silesia, the Duke of Brunswick, and humbly ask him to show mercy before justice. Although the encounter with the Prussian Duke takes place, she does not achieve the goal of giving her lover freedom.
Lisl doesn't give up. She is now using all her strength to get an audience with Friedrich II. The wish is granted to her. After listening eagerly to her story, the king says that he is enjoying being able to thwart the plan of his enemy Maria Theresa once again by making sure that the lieutenant can marry a middle-class girl. Rabenau receives freedom. So he succeeds in riding to Olomouc in time and delivering the empress's secret message to the commander there. In this way, the city is held as Austria's last strong bastion in front of Vienna.
The Empress knows to whom she owes the rescue of Olomouc to two people and grants an exemption from the principle that a noble officer may not marry a commoner.