In seinem Garten liebt Don Perlimplín Belisa

As in the case of his successful opera Bluthochzeit, Wolfgang Fortner also selected a work by Federico García Lorca for his composition In seinem Garten liebt Don Perlimplín Belisa [In his garden, Don Perlimplín loves Belisa].
As Don Perlimplin has already reached a certain age, he enters into a marriage of convenience with the younger Belisa. It is only Belisa’s adultery which prompts Don Perlimplín’s to fall genuinely in love with her. For her part, Belisa is in love with a mysterious lover who is, following a lost duel, established to have been Don Perlimplín himself. Belisa now has to bury her deceased husband, only then in recognition of true love. Fortner created a specific ‘characteristic musical sign’ for each of the four scenes of his twelve-tone chamber opera: a lyrical Scherzo is followed by a Nocturne, a Duet and a Serenade in which strict formal sections alternate with free formal improvisation.