Weber worked on Peter Schmoll from 1801 to 1802, and the work received its premiere in 1803. It is a youthful work—Weber was around fifteen years old when he composed it. The choice of subject seems to be the result of Weber's earnest efforts to establish himself as an opera composer. Other, more attempts that involved other kinds of literature were hardly successful. In choosing to compose an opera based on a popular novel in his day by Carl Gottlob Cramer that was first published between between 1798-99, Weber apparently wanted to capture the interest of the public in his work.

As one of Weber's stage works, Peter Schmoll is more properly a Singspiel than an opera, since the score involves extensive dialogue in its performance. The librettist Joseph Türk treated the novel quite literally in his text, and this did not allow for the work to translate well as an opera. For Weber the choice of a German topic was difficult at the time, since even Beethoven was struggling with such things while composing his opera Fidelio. The search for a suitable subject and an appropriate libretto was critical to Weber's development as an opera composer. Peter Schmoll is evidence of this endeavor, and it is remarkable for what Weber accomplished in the opera at a relatively early point in his career.

Unfortunately the spoken text for Peter Schmoll has become lost, and various solutions to performance exist. Beyond concert performance of the music numbers alone, there exists a performing version with new dialogue by K. Eggert (1927) and a veritable reworking of Peter Schmoll by Hans Hasse that was first performed in 1943; Willy Werner Göttig published in 1963 yet another revision of the text, with music adapted by Meinhard von Zallinger, and this version of the work has been recorded.

Peter Schmoll concerns the relationships between several individuals who were separated by the French Revolution. Several years later they find themselves brought back together and must reconcile the various directions that their lives have taken. On the surface, some of the situations seem superficial, yet at another level the kinds of choices they must make reflect values that supersede the minutiae of daily life. One would not readily associate this theme with a young composer, but the perspective that Weber brings to it is fresh in its depiction of the characters through musical elements.

In terms of style, Peter Schmoll resembles eighteenth-century models, which is what one would expect of Weber at this point in his career. The overture itself is more like something one would associate with one of Mozart's works than the kind of music encountered in Beethoven's more romantic overtures. The individual numbers tend to be arias—or ariettes—and the style resembles more those classical numbers, with balanced phrases and closed forms. Any ensembles are limited to numbers for two or three voices and, again, conform to expectations that exist with eighteenth-century models. Only in the finale to the third act does Weber use larger forces, but it is an ensemble comprised of the principals, rather than a more complex number involving soloists and chorus. In fact, the absence of choral forces in Peter Schmoll suggest that it is a chamber work rather than a grander work for the stage. Despite the conventional dismissal of Peter Schmoll among Weber's works, it stands out among other operas and Singspiels of his time for its mature and sophisticated approach to the music.



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