Friedenstag (Peace Day) is an opera in one act by Richard Strauss, his Opus 81 and TrV 271, to a German libretto by Joseph Gregor.

The opera was premiered at the National Theatre Munich on 24 July 1938[1] and dedicated to the leading singer Viorica Ursuleac and her husband, conductor Clemens Krauss.

[2] The opera thematically expresses anti-war sentiments, which William Mann has described as "a determined counter to the militaristic policies of Nazi Germany".

Stefan Zweig came up with the idea of the opera, which he outlined in a letter to Strauss following up a meeting between the two at the Salzburg Festival in 1934.

In May 1949, to celebrate his 85th birthday, there were simultaneous performances of the opera in Paris and Brussels, broadcast by French radio.

The first professional production in the US took place at the Santa Fe Opera on 28 July 1988 with a cast that included Richard Lewis, Alessandra Marc, and Mark Lundberg.

A young Italian messenger from Piedmont arrives with a letter from the Emperor to the town Commandant, and then sings of his homeland.

The Mayor and a prelate appeal to the Commandant to surrender the town, claiming that both their side and the enemy are suffering needlessly.

Their voices contrast in their duet, she tired of war, he exulting in it and saying how he plans to explode the fortress, taking all its occupants with it.

The sergeant then reports that the Holstein troops are approaching, but not to attack, rather decked with streamers, flowers and white flags.

[13] Strauss rarely got involved in political matters: in 1914 he had refused to join the war-hysteria and did not sign up to the Manifesto of German Artists in support of the war effort, declaring that "Declarations about war and politics are not fitting for an artist, who must give his attention to his creations and his works".

Musicologist Pamela Potter argues that Zweig and Strauss constructed an opera whose surface aesthetic was acceptable to the Nazis, but had within it a clear pacifist and humanist message.

It was an opera dealing with German history (the end of the thirty years war in 1648), with the central character of a commandant who appealed to the Nazi ideal of the loyal and dedicated soldier.

The opera was performed many times in Germany, Austria and Italy and its popularity stemmed from the fact that it allowed people to openly express the preference for peace over war in a politically acceptable and safe way.

"[17] Part of the reason the Nazis were willing to allow its performance was no doubt to reinforce the image their propaganda was seeking to promote that Germany did not want war.

Adolf Hitler and many leading Nazi figures attended the opera in June 1939 in Vienna, when plans for the invasion of Poland a few months later would have been well under way.

On November 15, Strauss rushed back from Italy to Garmisch because his wife Pauline had telegraphed him to return because his Jewish daughter-in-law Alice was under house arrest.

In 1942, Strauss became involved in the attempts of his son Franz to get Jewish relatives out to Switzerland, including an ill-fated visit to the concentration camp at Theresienstadt.

On the verge of becoming a permanent resident, with the outbreak of war he suddenly became an enemy alien and had to give up his dream of living in Britain.

Depressed by the growth of intolerance, authoritarianism, and Nazism, feeling hopeless for the future for humanity, he committed suicide with his wife on 23 February 1942.