About the work
Doktor Faust is a „Dichtung für Musik“ (poem for music) in two preludes, an interlude and three main scenes by Ferruccio Busoni, who worked on the Faust material from 1910 and wrote the German text in December 1914. The composition remained unfinished at Busoni’s death in 1924; his student Philipp Jarnach completed the final scene before the work premiered on 21 May 1925 at the Dresden Semperoper under conductor Fritz Busch.
Plot
The scholar Faust conjures Mephistopheles and enters into a pact with him. He seduces the Duchess of Parma and brings guilt upon himself. As his allotted time runs out, the spirits of his victims appear to him; the work ends with Faust’s desperate struggle for redemption.
Cultural significance
The premiere was regarded as a major event of 1920s music theatre and is seen as the culmination of Busoni’s late work; in 1982 Antony Beaumont produced his own completion of the ending based on rediscovered sketches.