Les Contes d'Hoffmann (Opera)

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Les Contes d'Hoffmann (The Tales of Hoffmann) is an opera by French composer Jacques Offenbach and is based on several short stories by famed German author E.T.A. Hoffmann, who is also the opera's main protagonist. The opera follows Hoffmann as he interacts and often falls in love with the various characters from his short stories, sometimes with frustratingly dramatic results on the part of the protagonist. The opera stands as one of Offenbach's most celebrated operas, and by far his most widely performed and well-known, despite being left unfinished upon the composer's death. Of the many popular arias from Les Contes d'Hoffmann, the "Barcarolle" (Belle nuit, ô nuit d'amour) stands perhaps as one of the world's most well-known pieces of classical music.