"Operas I never (almost) heard (of)" 4 - Teutsch style fun?

My private summer series continues with Austrian Savoyard (there's something for the worst of you) Ludwig Thuille's comic opera "Lobetanz" (1896), once a success from Riga to New York (the Met, yes!) (and here is a contemporary review http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F00F13FF395E13738DDDA00994D9415B818DF1D3 

But Thuille's opera has seldom been heard or seen since the 2nd world war. The recording I listened to was from Innsbruck(!) in 1961 but totally satisfying and sung in style. "Lobetanz" is a less than funny "odd-guy-from-the-lower-orders-gets-the-princess"-story (though of course this theme has its modern variations) and with plenty of dialogues that aspire to be fun in a very "Teutsch" way.

       

But the composer warmed to his libretto half-way into the opera and the the music is both dramatic, lyrical and entertaining in more or less the right proportions and extremely well written. Think of Humperdinck's Hänsel & Gretel and possibly Strauss in humorous vein rather than Wagner (or if you heard anything by the "Masters" son, Siegfried, that's the stuff). Thuille also wrote beautiful chamber music which perhaps is better for his posthumous reputation than this once esteemed opera - listen for yourself and there is more of it where this comes from, very listenable - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1N_V1HSBZw&feature=share&list=RD027fi1hZXPrjk