The music tells the story of the renowned singer Orpheus, with the goal of giving people courage and hope. Orpheus and Eurydice are going to celebrate their wedding together with shepherds and nymphs. While Orpheus is still singing of his good fortune, a messenger informs him that Eurydice has died from a snake bite. Orpheus decides to descend to the underworld in order to win Eurydice back, or else to die himself. Hope accompanies Orpheus up to the banks of the river Styx, which encircles the underworld. He is unable to persuade the ferryman Charon to take him to the other shore. But when Charon falls asleep, he crosses into the realm of shadows by himself. While a chorus of spirits cheers Orpheus on, Persephone and Pluto, the royal couple of the underworld, argue. Orpheus laments his sorrow and asks the gods of the underworld to return Eurydice to him. Persephone, moved by Orpheus’s singing, convinces her husband to grant the singer’s request. Pluto, however, sets one condition: Orpheus must not look at Eurydice on their way back to the realm of the living. But Orpheus fails: walking in front of Eurydice, he looks back – and loses his beloved forever. Back on earth, Orpheus laments his fate, but he is answered only by Echo. Apollo, the god of the arts and Orpheus’s father, reminds him of the transience of happiness and sorrow on earth and takes his son with him up to heaven.