This famous work of Georges Bizet (1838-1875) was premiered at the Opéra Comique in Paris in March 1875 with bad reviews by the experts and the public. Interestingly, Bizet died of a heart attack at age 36 and could not see how his opera would later become one of the most represented and successful of all time.
It is based on the novel Carmen by Prosper Mérimée, who in turn was influenced by Gypsies (1824) of Russian Aleksander Pushkin.
