About the work
Light Cavalry is a comic operetta in two divisions by Franz von Suppé, with a libretto by Karl Costa. It premiered on 21 March 1866 at the Carltheater in Vienna and was among the first operettas to draw on the world of Hungarian hussars, a setting later revisited by Johann Strauss and Kálmán.
Plot
In a small Austro-Hungarian border town, the orphan Vilma is eyed with suspicion by the town's straitlaced wives and faces banishment, even though she loves young Hermann. When a squadron of Hungarian hussars is billeted there, their sergeant János recognises Vilma as the daughter he had believed dead. He exposes the townspeople's hypocrisy and thereby forces their consent to Vilma and Hermann's marriage.
Cultural significance
Of the operetta itself, mainly the overture remains known today: its famous cavalry march, familiar as the “Light Cavalry Overture”, is among Suppé's most frequently performed concert pieces, even though that march never actually occurs within the stage work. The stage piece itself fell into obscurity soon after Austria's defeat in the war of 1866.