Shakespeare Operas

Opera Adaptations and Operas Inspired by Shakespeare Plays

Note: We know some Shakespeare operas, especially the early ones, included ballets and dancing; for others, staged dancing is less likely or a directorial choice, but we have included those anyway for completeness. Dates are premiers and the first name listed is the composer, with additional names the librettists (in addition to Shakespeare, of course) if known.

Antony and Cleopatra

1966, 1975 – Samuel Barber and Franco Zeffirelli, with Alvin Ailey as choreographer for 1966 premiere

The Comedy of Errors

1943 – Iša Krejčí and Josef Bachtík, Pozdvižení v Efesu (Turmoil in Ephesus)

Falstaff Operas

1799 – Antonio Salieri, Falstaff, ossia Le tre burle (Falstaff, or The Three Jokes)
1849 – Otto Nicolai and Salomon Hermann Mosenthal, Der Iustigen Weiber von Windsor
1893 – Giuseppe Verdi and Arrigo Boito, Falstaff — combines scenes from Henry IV parts 1 and 2 and The Merry Wives of Windsor
1925 – Gustav Holst, At the Boar’s Head — based on Henry IV parts 1 and 2
1929 – Ralph Vaughan Williams, Sir John in Love

Hamlet

1865 – Franco Faccio and Arrigo Boito, Amleto
1868 – Ambroise Thomas and Michel Carré and Jules Barbier
2017 – Brett Dean and Matthew Jocelyn

Julius Caesar

1788 – Francesco Bianchi and Gaetano Sertor, La morte di Cesare (The Death of Caesar)
1959 – Giselher Klebe, Die Ermordung Cäsars (The Murder of Caesar)

King Lear

1850s – Libretto by Antonio Somma commissioned by Giuseppe Verdi but he never composed music for it, Re Lear
1978 – Aribert Reimann and Claus Henneberg, Lear
1998 – Toshio Hosokawa and Tadashi Suzuki, Vision of Lear
2000 – Aulis Sallinen, Kuningas Lear

Love’s Labour’s Lost

1973 – Nicolas Nabokov and W. H. Auden and Chester Kallman

Macbeth

1847 (Italian), 1865 (French) – Giuseppe Verdi and Francesco Maria Piave and Andrea Maffei
1910 – Ernest Bloch and Edmond Fleg

Measure for Measure

1836 – Richard Wagner, Das Liebesverbot (The Ban on Love)

The Merchant of Venice

1905 – Josef Bohuslav Foerster, Jessika
1935 – Reynaldo Hahn and Miguel, Le Marchand de Venise
1968-1982 (composed), premiere 2013 – André Tchaikowsky and John O’Brien

The Merry Wives of Windsor (see also, Falstaff operas)

1799 – Antonio Salieri, Falstaff, ossia Le tre burle (Falstaff, or The Three Jokes)
1849 – Otto Nicolai and Salomon Hermann Mosenthal, Der Iustigen Weiber von Windsor
1929 – Ralph Vaughan Williams, Sir John in Love

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

1692 – Henry Purcell, The Fairy-Queen
1716 – Richard Leveridge, The Comickal Masque of Pyramus and Thisbe
1745 – John Frederick Lampe, Pyramis and Thisbe
1949 – Marcel Delannoy and André Boll, Puck
1960 – Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears
2011 – Jeremy Sams et al., The Enchanted Island — pastiche of The Tempest and A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Much Ado About Nothing

1862 – Hector Berlioz, Béatrice et Bénédict
1901 – Charles Villiers Stanford and Julian Sturgis

Othello

1816 – Giulio Rossini and Francesco Berio di Salsa, Otello
1887 – Giuseppe Verdi and Arrigo Boito, Otello
1999 – Daron Hagen and Paul Muldoon, Bandanna

Romeo and Juliet

1776 – Georg Benda and Friedrich Wilhelm Gotter, Romeo und Julia
1796 – Niccolò Antonio Zingarelli and Giuseppe Maria Foppa, Giulietta e Romeo
1825 – Nicola Vaccai and Felice Romani, Giulietta e Romeo
1830 – Vincenzo Bellini and Felice Romani, I Capuleti e i Montecchi
1867 – Charles Gounod and Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, Roméo et Juliette
1901 – Frederick Delius, A Village Romeo and Juliet
1940 – Heinrich Sutermeister, Romeo und Julia
1957 – Leonard Bernstein, West Side Story

The Taming of the Shrew

1874 – Hermann Goetz and Josephy Victor Widmann, Der Widerspänstigen Zähmung
1896 – Ruperto Chapi and Carlos Fernández Shaw and José López Silva, Las bravías (The Pigeons)
1927 – Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari and Giovacchino Forzano, Sly, ovvero La leggenda del dormiente risvegliato (Sly, or The Legend of the Sleeper Awoken)
1953 – Vittorio Giannini and Dorothy Fee
1953 – Cole Porter, Kiss Me Kate
1955 – Vissarion Shebalin and Abram Akimovich Gozenpud, Ukroshchenye stroptivoy
1963 – Dominick Argento and John Gay Manlove, Christopher Sly

The Tempest

1674 – Henry Purcell and Thomas Shadwell, The Enchanted Isle
1756 – John Christopher Smith and David Garrick, The Tempest of The Enchanted Isle
1778 – Friedrich Hildebrand von Einsiedel (libretto), Die Geisterinsel (The Enchanted Island)
1796 – Friedrich Wilhelm Gotter (libretto), Die Geisterinsel (The Enchanted Island)
1798 – Gotter’s libretto used by composers: Johann Friedrich Anton Fleischmann (1st), Johann Friedrich Reichardt (2nd), Johann Friedrich Zumsteeg (3rd)
1922 – Felice Lattuada
1956 – Frank Martin, August Schlegel, and Johann Tieck, Der Sturm
1970 – Michael Tippett, The Knot Garden
1984 – Luciano Berio, Un Re In Ascolto (A Listening King)
1985 – John C. Eaton
1986 – Lee Holby and Mark Shulgasser
1991 – Michael Nyman with choreography by Karine Saporta, Noises, Sounds & Sweet Airs
2004 – Thomas Adès and Meredith Oakes
2011 – Jeremy Sams et al., The Enchanted Island — pastiche of The Tempest and A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Timon of Athens

1991 – Stephen Oliver

Troilus and Cressida

Note: William Walton and Christopher Hassall’s opera Troilus and Cressida (1954) is based on Chaucer’s poem not on Shakespeare’s play

Twelfth Night

1874-1883 (unfinished), premiere 1924 – Bedřich Smetana and Eliška Krásnohorská, Viola

The Winter’s Tale

1872 – Max Bruch and Emil Hopffer, Hermione
1999 – Philippe Boesmans, Luc Bondy, and Marie-Louise Bischofberger, Wintermärchen
2017 – Ryan Wigglesworth

The Sonnets and Poems

1937 – Ottorino Respighi and Claudio Guastalla, Lucrezia (inspired by The Rape of Lucrece)
1968 – André Tchaikowsky, Seven Sonnets of Shakespeare (Sonnets are 104, 75, 49, 61, 89, 90, and 146)
1997 – Hans Werner Henze and Hans-Ulrich Treichel, Venus und Adonis

Updated July 2, 2022.