Prelude to a Drama

'The quintessence of Schreker's entire production is found in the prelude to the opera 'Die Gezeichneten' (The Marked Ones). The subject of the opera, unquestionably Schreker's best, is a neo-Romantic-Renaissance drama following Wilde's fairy tale of the Dwarf and the Infanta. The overture - which also exists in an expanded concert version (Prelude to a Drama) in a sonata form which, however, remains superficial to the composition - takes more note of the atmosphere surrounding the main characters than to the story line' (Theodor W. Adorno in a radio talk 1959).