About the work
Der Corregidor is a comic opera in four acts by Hugo Wolf to a libretto by Rosa Mayreder, based on Pedro Antonio de Alarcón's novella "El sombrero de tres picos" (The Three-Cornered Hat). It premiered on 7 June 1896 at the Mannheim National Theatre under Hugo Röhr; it is Wolf's only completed opera.
Plot
In early-19th-century Andalusia, the corregidor (magistrate) Don Eugenio de Zuñiga pursues the young miller's wife Frasquita, wife of the miller Tío Lukas. A comedy of mistaken identity involving swapped clothes brings both couples to the brink of disaster before the corregidor and his wife, and Frasquita and her husband, are reconciled at the end.
Cultural significance
Wolf, who had until then composed almost exclusively songs, turned to opera for the first time with Der Corregidor; the premiere was initially acclaimed but quickly lost favour with the ensemble after the second performance and has remained rarer in the repertoire than Wolf's songs.