The Lay of the Love and Death of Cornet Christoph Rilke, by Viktor Ullmann, is a melodrama composed in 1944 in the Theresienstadt concentration camp, shortly before the author’s death, in Auschwitz. Based on the prose poem by Rainer Maria Rilke, it narrates the final journey of a young aristocrat sent to war, through poetic and melancholic scenes. Viktor Ullmann’s musical treatment clarifies much of the action through musical motifs. The work is challenging and regarded as one of the composer’s musical testaments, revealing a deep union between Rilke’s poetry and Ullmann’s expressive musical force.