Orpheus is the fourth of Liszt's 12 symphonic poems, written during his tenure as Grand Ducal Director of Music Extraordinary at Weimar. While conducting a performance of Gluck's Orfeo ed Eurydice at the Weimar Court Theatre in 1854, he decided to compose a prelude and postlude to Orfeo; these were performed with the opera on February 16, 1854. Though the postlude remains little known and was in fact lost for many years, the prelude survives as the symphonic poem Orpheus.

The plot of the opera itself had little to do with the creation of Liszt's tone poem; it merely provided the impetus for the composer's preoccupation with the title character. Liszt had previously seen an Etruscan vase at the Louvre which pictured the mythological Orpheus singing and playing his lyre, taming the wild animals around him. This image fascinated the composer, who saw Orpheus as a symbol of the civilizing influence of music and the arts upon mankind's baser instincts.

Orpheus is unlike Liszt's other symphonic poems in that it portrays no conflict, failure, or victory; instead it takes on the quality of a tonal "stream." The main theme, introduced on horns and harps (in imitation of Orpheus' lyre), is explored and developed in the horns and cellos and is eventually juxtaposed against a contrasting motive introduced by a solo violin. A pious, devotional chord progression brings the work to a hushed close.



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