Editing Der Freischütz (section)

==Performance history==
The reception of ''Der Freischütz'' surpassed Weber's own hopes and it quickly became an international success, with productions in Vienna the same year followed by Dresden, Leipzig, Hamburg, Munich, Karlsruhe, Königsberg, Prague, other German centres, Riga and Copenhagen. 1824 saw productions in four London theatres in four different adaptations, as well as an inadequate<ref>{{cite book|last=Turner|first=Walter J.|author-link=Walter J. Turner|title=Berlioz: The Man and His Work|year=1934|page=69}}</ref> adaptation by François [[Castil-Blaze]] in French, named ''Robin des Bois'' at the [[Théâtre de l'Odéon]].<ref>"Carl Maria von Weber: ''Der Freischütz''". In: {{ill|Piotr Kamiński|fr|lt=Kamiński, Piotr}}. ''Mille et un opéras''. Fayard, 2003, pp. 1726–1727.</ref>

In order to get round the [[Paris Opera]]'s ban on spoken text,{{citation needed|date=July 2021}} a version in French with [[recitative]]s was prepared in 1841 by [[Hector Berlioz]] – who greatly admired the opera and feared other arrangers might do worse{{citation needed|date=July 2021}} – which incorporated his orchestration of Weber's [[Invitation to the Dance (Weber)|Invitation to the Dance]]<ref>''Berlioz and the Romantic Imagination.'' Catalogue for exhibition at Victoria and Albert Museum for Berlioz centenary. Art Council, London, 1969, p. 84.</ref> to serve as a ballet, another Paris Opera requirement.{{citation needed|date=July 2021}} [[Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky]] criticised Berlioz's arrangement in the [[Bolshoi Theatre]] production of 1873 as "utterly incongruous", "tasteless" and "silly"<ref>{{cite web|url=http://en.tchaikovsky-research.net/pages/The_Italian_Opera|title=The Italian Opera|website=en.tchaikovsky-research.net}}</ref> because it inserted into the rustic opera an urban piece of music. In 1879 he again criticised a performance in Paris:
<blockquote>''Der Freischütz'' afforded me great pleasure; in many places in the first act my eyes were moist with tears. In the second act [[Gabrielle Krauss|Krauss]] pleased me greatly by her wonderful rendition of Agathe's aria. The Wolf's Glen was staged not at all as splendidly as I had expected. The third act was curious because of the French brazenness with which they took the liberty, on the one hand, of inserting ''Invitation à la valse'' with the most stupid dances, and, on the other, of cutting out the role of the hermit who appears at the end for the dénouement.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://en.tchaikovsky-research.net/pages/Carl_Maria_von_Weber|title=Carl Maria von Weber|website=en.tchaikovsky-research.net}}</ref></blockquote>

Berlioz's arrangement again underlay the production at the Paris [[Opéra-Comique]] in 2011.<ref>''Le Freischütz''. Opéra-Comique season book 2010–2011, pp. 37–38.</ref> His orchestration of ''Invitation à la valse'' soon became a concert piece in its own right.

Weber's overture and the "Huntsmen's Chorus" from act 3 ("With princely enjoyment and manly employment") are often performed as concert pieces.