It’s not often you get a composer-princess popping up. Alongside her princessly duties, this Duchess also furthered the cause of the arts and culture in her court, influencing her children to do the same.
In 1776 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was visiting Anna Amalia’s court. In 1773 he had taken the 1764 ballad of ‘Angelica and Edwin the Hermit’ from Oliver Goldsmith’s novel The Vicar of Wakefield.
Anna Amalia set this to music, and it’s testament to her high prowess as a composer as it combines elements of opera seria, opera buffa, and folk song.
The work lay pretty much untouched until 1999 when students from Cambridge staged a performance, unleashing a revival of interest in Anna Amalia and her works:
The Listening Project Blog 