With its tunes and deeply moving story, taken from the real life, La Bohème has earned the epithet of one of the most successful and most renowned operas in general. Libretto was based upon the novel Scènes de la vie de bohème by Henri Murger, in which the author describes the world of the students and artists in the Latin Quarter in Paris.

The internal conflict between love and duty is a frequent instigator of the plot of many operas. Bellini's heroine is torn between the sacred duty of serving herown people and the love she feels for the enemy conqueror. She finds the solution in her own, personal sacrifice.

Although rarely performed, Mazeppa is considered the most powerful opera by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. The libretto, which was based on Pushkin's narrative poem Poltava abounds with correspondences with the composer's life, which make Mazeppa one of his most personal works.

With his Don Giovanni Mozart joins a small group of the immortals, whose names and works will never be forgotten, said the equally immortal Sören Kierkegaard.

Should we consider The Magic Flute a fairy-tale or an allegory? Or is it only a secret testimony of the freemasons? There is probably no other opera which offers the possibility of so many different interpretations, which is so simple and at the same time more complex than any other opera work.

Rossini’s most popular opera is considered the best comic opera ever. The libretto was written by Cesare Sterbini, following Le Barbier de Seville, the first part of the Figaro trilogy by Beaumarchais.

Cinderella is the most complex of all Rossini’s operas because, besides the recongizable and unsurpassed sense of comedy, it abounds with the elements of opera seria, and is musically more demanding than any score he had written so far.

Falstaff is actually a combination of three Shakespeare’s works and more refined than its models. Falstaff is not so much a victim of deception and schemes, but the occasion for fun, jokes and laughter. Richard Strauss proclaimed Falstaff one of the greatest operas of all times.

The first opera? This generally accepted statement for Monteverdi’s Orpheus is corroborated by the fact that the date of its opening night in 1607 marked the beginning of a new century and the beginning of a new era in music, which corresponds perfectly with the beginning of the 21st century.

Bizet’s Carmen had its world-premiere in Opera Comique in Paris on March 3, 1875. The theatre was packed with the intention to bring a unanimous public opinion about the new opera which had developed from the court amusement into burgeois property of the Western civilization.

Rigoletto was made upon the novel The King Takes His Amusement by Victor Hugo, inspired by the French king Fran ois I. The libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave, and Verdi was attracted by the character of the despised court jester, a hunchback, a man filled with deep hatred, love and pain.

The most popular and most frequently performed Croatian opera Ero the Joker had its world-premiere in Zagreb in 1935 and has not left the repertoire of all Croatian opera houses ever since. Its enormous popularity and international success is the result of the ideal cooperation between the writer Milan Begović and the composer Jakov Gotovac. The exceptional humour of the libretto stems from the perfect vitality of the characters from the Dalmatian hinterland, completed by the richly orchestrated music of lively rhythm. The opera abounds with beautiful arias, duets and ensembles, with the popular wheel dance for the finale.