Friedrich Adolf Ferdinand, Freiherr von Flotow /flo:to/ (27 April 1812 – 24 January 1883) was a German composer. He is chiefly remembered for his opera Martha, which was popular in the 19th century and the early part of the 20th.

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in German. (November 2023) Click [show] for important translation instructions. View a machine-translated version of the German article. Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia. Consider adding a topic to this template: there are already 9,112 articles in the main category, and specifying|topic= will aid in categorization. Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article. You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is Content in this edit is translated from the existing German Wikipedia article at [[:de:Friedrich von Flotow]]; see its history for attribution. You should also add the template {{Translated|de|Friedrich von Flotow}} to the talk page. For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

Born in Teutendorf, in Mecklenburg, into an aristocratic family, Flotow was French-trained. Although he was intended for a diplomatic career, his father acceded to his wishes and he studied at the Conservatoire de Paris under Anton Reicha.^[1] During this time came under the influence of Auber, Rossini, Meyerbeer, Donizetti, Halévy, and later Gounod and Offenbach. These influences are reflected in his operas, where a distinctive French opéra comique flavour exists.

During the 1830 revolution he returned home, writing chamber music and operetta until it was safe to return to Paris.^[1] He completed his first opera in 1835, Pierre et Cathérine, but his breakthrough came with Le naufrage de la Méduse (1839), based on the wreck of the warship Méduse. The three-act romantic opera Alessandro Stradella of 1844 is recognized as one of Flotow's finer works. Martha was first staged in Vienna at the Theater am Kärntnertor on 25 November 1847, and soon became one of the best-loved of all his operas.

In 1848 revolution again drove Flotow home.^[1] Between 1856 and 1863 he served as Intendant of the court theatre at Schwerin. From 1863 he lived in either Paris or Vienna,^[1] and he had the satisfaction of seeing his operas mounted as far away as Saint Petersburg and Turin. He died in Darmstadt.