Using the initials “ETPA” (Ermelinda Talea Pastorella Arcada) Maria Antonia Walpurgis published her two operas Il trionfo della fedeltà (1754) and Talestri, Regina delle amazoni (1760). The princess herself participated in the first performances that took place in the court theatre and the historian and traveller Dr. Charles Burney warmly praised her vocal talent. Her operas were also performed in other European cities and published by Breitkopf. Some historians have attributed alterations to the text of Il trionfo de la fedeltà to Pietro Metastasio, the most popular and admired opera librettist in all Europe, and believe Hasse could have also revised the score. Hasse and Frederick the Great warmly praised these operas, while the Italian poet Metastasio maintained a long and lively exchange of letters with Walpurgis, declaring himself to be one of her great admirers. As is more than often the case with such important artists, it is difficult to discern to what degree Maria Antonia’s high ranking influenced their praise.

It has been said of the Saxon princess that “[she] alone contradicts the vulgar accusation against her sex: her unique gifts demonstrate that the weakness of spirit, of which she is often accused, is not a physical effect of her sex any longer, but a mere moral consequence of education”. This passage, which many would deem to be the fitting words of an over-excited feminist, fond of projecting present-day battles onto remote historical periods, was in fact written by Antonio de Eximeno (1729-1808). A philosopher, mathematician, historian and music theorist, Antonio de Eximeno went so far as to propose an aria from Talestri, Regina delle amazoni as a compositional model in his treatise Dell’ origine e delle regole della musica (1774). Eximeno (Aristoxeno Megareo to his “shepherds” at the Arcadian Academy) had dedicated his book to Maria Antonia Walpurgis, favourably comparing her with the great Metastasio. According to Eximeno, Metastasio should be content for having “stimulated the genius of composers with his librettos” while Maria Antonia wrote the poetry and the music and was even capable of performing it, singing and accompanying herself at the harpsichord. Frederick the Great had expressed himself in very similar terms some years before.