Also sneaking out to enjoy some masquerading is Leander’s mother Magdelone, also under house arrest trapped in an unhappy marriage, she only wants to go out and have some fun. Not far behind is Leonard, wanting to experience this near-magical place. Leander’s father, Jeronimus, fuming with rage, tries unsuccessfully to make Leander honour his promise to Leonard’s daughter, but he refuses.ĭespite being under house arrest, Leander and Henrik make their way to the masquerade to meet Leonora again. The trouble is, Leander is already engaged to the daughter of Leonard, a merchant from the country. Not long after, his servant Henrik, something of a Figaro type with a pronounced Socialist streak, also wakes up, and the two start recounting the happenings of last night’s masquerade: Leander met a girl, Leonora, and, as seems to be customary in this kind of operation, they got engaged. The curtain rises to show our hero, Leander, waking up from a particularly nasty hangover. Maskarade takes place in Copenhagen in the spring of 1723. The same can be said for Carl Nielsen’s adaptation of Ludvig Holberg’s 1724 comedy Maskarade (“ Masquerade”), a rather trite, only occasionally funny play that still served as the basis for an opera bursting with irresistible melodies, wit and colourful, inventive orchestration. There must be something about not very good comedies that make for good operas: Verdi’s Falstaff, his adaptation of Shakespeare’s Merry Wives of Windsor, is surely among his greatest works, even though the source material is not exactly brilliant.
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