Aria of Agathe (Der Freischütz)

Der Freischütz opened the new Schauspielhaus in Berlin on 18 June 1821, five years after Weber began sketching it; the audience demanded encores and the piece spread across German-speaking Europe within months. Friedrich Kind's libretto came from a tale in the Gespensterbuch: a marksman casts seven magic bullets in a forest gorge at midnight, six of which strike where he aims and the seventh where the devil chooses. Weber built the score out of folk song, hunting horns and orchestral darkness, and made the forest itself a character. German Romantic opera is usually dated from this evening.