William Shakespeare’s successful play ´A Midsummer Night’s Dream´ is the model for Henry Purcell’s ´The Fairy Queen´. The fact that the plot was partly modified for the newly created work is due not only to artistic freedom but also to the adaptation to the taste of the audience, as well as to the fact that the comedy was transferred to another genre, that of the semi-opera. Although Midsummer Night’s Dream still enjoyed great popularity, it was a good 100 years old at the time of Purcell’s adaptation. Contemporary London audiences, on the other hand, favoured the semi-opera, a genre that had evolved from the masque and musical theatre and flourished in late 17th century Baroque England - with Purcell as one of its most prominent composers.
First performed in 1692, the 5-act ´The Fairy Queen´ is one of the most successful representatives of its genre. After Purcell’s death, the score was lost, only to be reawakened from its slumber at the Royal Academy of Music in 1901.