Gluck's second French reform Opera Orphee Et Euridice was first performed in 1774. It was a reworking of a previous Italian opera that Gluck had composed in Venice in 1762 and which marked the begininning of Gluck's operatic reforms. He had the libretto translated from Italian to French and modified and recast the entire opera to cater to the taste of the French audiences. The present arrangement …

Hector Berlioz was enthralled by Gluck and heard his masterpieces Iphigénie en Tauride Orphée Alceste and Armide in Paris.The original Italian version of Orphée gives the title role to a castrato. Gluck rewrote the part for high tenor for the performances in France (1774). In 1859 Berlioz arranged the opera so that Orpheus could be sung by the great mezzo-soprano Pauline Viardot with whom he w…