Der fidele Bauer (complete operetta recorded in 2010)

Our cooperation with the Lehár Festival in Bad Ischl continues to be a boon for operetta fans. Here successful operettas from the past, practically never included in the performance programs of normal theaters today, are rescued from oblivion in lively and musically exemplary presentations. Such was the case with two works in 2010: Lehár's Frasquita (to be released next month!) and Leo Fall's Die fidele Bauer. Today Fall is certainly the least known composer from the era of the silver operetta - which is a complete injustice. Although Fall was not a master who produced splendid melodies lingering forever in the ear even on a first hearing, he was in every way a master of characterization, thematic work, and instrumentation. Of all operetta composers he perhaps came the closest to the tone of the comic opera. Such is also the case in Der fidele Bauer, an antioperetta set in part in a peasant milieu and composed when Lehár's Die lustige Witwe had just come out. Here Fall himself penned, in the duet of the poor little penniless Heinerle, a melody with hit potential and genuine folk character.