The Merry Widow

The Merry Widow is an operetta by the Austro-Hungarian composer Franz Lehar. The librettists, Leo Stein, Viktor Leon, based the story – relating a rich widow, and her countrymen’s trying to keep her money in the principality by getting her the right husband – on an 1861 comedy play, L’attache d’ambassade by Henri Meilhac.

The operatta has taken pleasure in extraordinary international success since its 1905 premiere in Vienna and carries on to be regularly accepted and recorded. Film and other adaptation have also been made. Well-known music from the score comprises the “Vilja Song”, “Da geh’ ich zu Maxim”, and the “Merry Widow Waltz”.