It is also possible that the 1861 Dresden title change was out of respect for Spohr's close and long association with the city. Others claim the opposite: that the retitling was done to emphasise Gounod's opera's reliance on Goethe's characters, and to differentiate it from Louis Spohr's Faust, which had held the stage for many years in Germany and had recently appeared (1851) in a three-act revision. Some sources claim this was out of respect for part 1 of Goethe's poetic drama, which the opera follows closely. For many years this custom – or alternatively, staging the opera as Gretchen – continued in Germany. Performances in Germany followed, with Dresden Semperoper in 1861 being the first to bill the work as Margarethe rather than Faust. Īfter a successful initial run at the Théâtre Lyrique the publisher Antoine Choudens, who purchased the copyright for 10,000 francs, took the work (now with recitatives replacing the spoken dialogue) on tour through Germany, Belgium, Italy and England, with Caroline Miolan-Carvalho repeating her role.

The tenor Hector Gruyer was originally cast as Faust but was found to be inadequate during rehearsals, being eventually replaced by a principal of the Opéra-Comique, Joseph-Théodore-Désiré Barbot, shortly before the opening night. The manager of the Théâtre Lyrique, Léon Carvalho cast his wife Caroline Miolan-Carvalho as Marguerite and there were various changes during production, including the removal and contraction of several numbers. The original version of Faust employed spoken dialogue, and it was in this form that the work was first performed.

Faust opera music