Zar und Zimmermann

Zar und Zimmermann
Opera by Albert Lortzing
The composer
TranslationTsar and Carpenter
LibrettistLortzing
LanguageGerman
Based onDer Bürgermeister von Saardam
by Georg Christian Römer
Premiere
22 December 1837 (1837-12-22)
Stadttheater, Leipzig

Zar und Zimmermann (Tsar and Carpenter) is a comic opera in three acts, music by Albert Lortzing, libretto by the composer after Georg Christian Römer's Der Bürgermeister von Saardam, oder Die zwei Peter, itself based on the French play Le Bourgmestre de Saardam, ou Les deux Pierre by Mélésville, Jean-Toussaint Merle, and Eugène Centiran de Boirie. Ultimately, it goes back to the historical Grand Embassy of Peter the Great. Gaetano Donizetti had set the same story in his 1827 opera Il borgomastro di Saardam.