About the work
The Marriage of Camacho is a comic opera in two acts by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, his only completed work for the public opera stage. He wrote the first act as early as 1824/25, at just fifteen, and completed the overture in February 1825. The premiere took place on 29 April 1827 at the Royal Schauspielhaus in Berlin, with a libretto reworked by the theatre's management.
Plot
The plot follows an episode from Cervantes' Don Quixote: the wealthy Camacho is to marry young Quiteria, who instead loves the poor student Basilio. At the wedding feast Basilio fakes a fatal wound and, seemingly dying, is quickly married to Quiteria before turning out to be unharmed. Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, present among the wedding guests, are drawn into the ensuing confusion; in the end Camacho gives up his claim to Quiteria, accepting that a marriage without love would have brought him no happiness anyway.
Cultural significance
The opera's only performance was undermined when the singer of Don Quixote fell ill; disappointed by how the evening had gone, Mendelssohn chose not to arrange further performances. The work remained unpublished during his lifetime and fell into obscurity — today almost only its overture is still regularly heard in concert.