Verdi, Giuseppe

Verdi was born on October 10, 1813 in the village of Le Roncollet, near Busseto ( Duchy of Parma ). The composer's father, Carlo Verdi, kept a village inn , and his mother, Luigi Uttini, was a spider. The family lived poorly and Giuseppe's childhood was difficult. In the village church, he helped to celebrate Mass . He studied musical literacy and playing the organ with Pietro Beistrocca. Noticing his son's craving for music, parents gave Giuseppe a spinet . The composer kept this very imperfect instrument until the end of his life.

Antonio Barezzi, a wealthy merchant and music lover from the neighboring town of Busseto, drew attention to a musically gifted boy. He believed that Verdi would not be a innkeeper and not a village organist, but a great composer. On the advice of Barezzi, the 10-year-old Verdi moved to study in Busseto. Thus began a new, even more difficult streak of life - the years of adolescence and youth . On Sundays, Giuseppe went to Le Roncollet, where he played the organ during the Mass. Verdi also had a composition teacher, Fernando Prowezi, director of the Busseto Philharmonic Society. Carry was engaged not only in counterpoint, he aroused in Verdi a craving for serious reading. Giuseppe's attention is drawn to the classics of world literature - Shakespeare , Dante , Goethe , Schiller . One of his favorite works is the novel The Betrothed by the great Italian writer Alessandro Manzoni .

In Milan , where Verdi went at the age of eighteen, in order to continue his education, he was not admitted to the Conservatory (today named Verdi) “because of the low level of piano playing; in addition, there were age restrictions in the conservatory ” ^[9] . Verdi began taking private lessons of counterpoint, attending at the same time opera performances , as well as just concerts. Communication with the Milanese elite convinced him to seriously think about the career of a theater composer.

Returning to Busseto, with the support of Antonio Barezzi (Antonio Barezzi - a local merchant and music lover supporting Verdi's musical ambitions), Verdi gave his first public appearance at Barezzi's house in 1830.

Fascinated by Verdi's musical gift, Barezzi invites him to become a music teacher for his daughter Margarita. Soon the young people became passionately in love with each other and on May 4, 1836, Verdi would marry Margarita Barezzi. Soon Margarita gave birth to two children: Virginia Maria Louise (March 26, 1837 - August 12, 1838) and Itsilio Romano (July 11, 1838 - October 22, 1839). While Verdi worked on his first opera, both children die in infancy. After some time (June 18, 1840) at the age of 26 ^{[10], the} composer's wife Margarita dies of encephalitis ^{[11] [12]} .

The first production of Verdi's opera (Oberto, Count Bonifacchio) ( Oberto ) in La Scala, Milan, was approved by critics, after which the theater’s impresario , Bartolomeo Merelli, offered Verdi a contract for two operas. They became “ King for an hour ” ( Un giorno di regno ) and “ Nabucco ” (“Nebuchadnezzar”). Verdi's wife and two children died when he worked on the first of these two operas. After its failure, the composer wanted to stop writing opera music. However, the premiere of Nabucco on March 9, 1842 at La Scala was very successful and established Verdi's reputation as an opera composer. Over the next year, the opera was staged in Europe 65 times and has since taken a firm place in the repertoire of the world's leading opera houses. Nabucco was immediately followed by several operas, including Lombardi on the Crusade ( I Lombardi alla prima crociata ) and Ernani , which were staged and were successful in Italy.

In 1847, the opera Lombardy, rewritten and renamed to Jerusalem ( Jérusalem ), was staged by the Paris Opera on November 26, 1847 , becoming Verdi's first work in the style of a grand opera . To do this, the composer had to rework this opera and replace Italian characters with French ones.

At the age of thirty-eight, Verdi had an affair with Giuseppina Strepponi , a singer (soprano), who was ending her career by that time (they got married only eleven years later, and their cohabitation before the wedding was considered scandalous in many of the places where they had to live) . Soon, Giuseppina stopped speaking, and Verdi, following the example of Joacchino Rossini , decided to end his career with his wife. He was wealthy, famous and in love. Perhaps it was Giuseppina who convinced him to continue writing operas. Verdi's first opera, written after "retirement," became his first masterpiece - Rigoletto. The libretto of the opera, based on Victor Hugo ’s play “ The King Funs ”, underwent significant changes in favor of censorship, and the composer intended to quit the work several times until finally the opera was completed. The first production took place in Venice in 1851 and was a tremendous success.

Rigoletto is perhaps one of the best operas in the history of musical theater. Verdi's artistic generosity is presented in it in full force. Beautiful melodies are scattered throughout the score, arias and ensembles, which have become an integral part of the classical opera repertoire, follow each other, and the comic and tragic merge together.

La Traviata, Verdi's next great opera, was composed and staged two years after Rigoletto. The libretto was written based on the play by Alexander Dumas the son “ Lady with Camellias ”.

Then several more operas followed, among them the constantly performed Sicilian Vespers ( Les vêpres siciliennes ; commissioned by the Paris Opera), Troubadour ( Il Trovatore ), Masquerade Ball ( Un ballo in maschera ), Strength fate ”( La forza del destino ; 1862, commissioned by the Imperial Bolshoi Stone Theater of St. Petersburg ), second edition of the opera Macbeth .

In 1869, Verdi composed "Libera Me" to the Requiem in Memory of Gioacchino Rossini (the remaining parts were written by now little-known Italian composers). In 1874, Verdi wrote his Requiem for the death of the writer he revered Alessandro Manzoni, including in it a revised version of the previously written "Libera Me".

One of Verdi’s last great operas, Aida, was commissioned by the Egyptian government to mark the opening of the Suez Canal . Verdi initially refused. While in Paris, he received a second offer through du Locle. This time Verdi got acquainted with the opera script, which he liked, and agreed to write an opera.

Verdi and Wagner, each - the leader of his national opera school - always did not like each other. In their entire lives they have never met. Verdi's surviving comments about Wagner and his music are few and unfriendly ("He always chooses, in vain, an unpolished path, trying to fly where a normal person just goes on foot, achieving much better results.") However, learning that Wagner was dead, Verdi said: “How sad! This name has left a huge mark in the history of art. " Only one statement by Wagner related to Verdi's music is known. After listening to Requiem, the great German, always eloquent, always generous with (unflattering) comments in relation to many other composers, said: "It is better not to say anything."

"Aida" was delivered in Cairo in 1871 with great success.

Over the next twelve years, Verdi worked very little, slowly editing some of his early things.

The opera Otello , based on a play by William Shakespeare , was staged in Milan in 1887 . The music of this opera is "continuous", it does not contain the division of arias and recitatives traditional for the Italian opera - this innovation was introduced under the influence of the opera reform of Richard Wagner (after the death of the latter). In addition, under the influence of the same Wagnerian reform, the late Verdi style acquired a greater degree of recitativeness, which gave the opera an effect of more realism, although it frightened away some admirers of traditional Italian opera.

Verdi’s last opera, Falstaff , whose libretto by Arrigo Boyto , a librettist and composer, wrote on the basis of Shakespeare’s Merry Wives of Windsor , translated into French by Victor Hugo , developed a “cross-cutting” ". The brilliantly written score of this comedy is thus much closer to the Wagnerian Mastersingers than to the comic operas by Rossini and Mozart . The elusive and sparkling melodies allow you not to delay the development of the plot and create a unique confusion effect, so close to the spirit of this Shakespearean comedy. The opera ends with a seven-voice fugue, in which Verdi fully demonstrates his brilliant counterpoint mastery.

On January 21, 1901, Verdi suffered a stroke while staying at the Grand Et De Milan Hotel ^[13] ( Milan , Italy). Being stricken with paralysis , he could hear the scores of the operas Bohemia and Tosca by Puccini , The Clownes by Leoncavallo , The Queen of Spades by Tchaikovsky , but what he thought about these operas written by his immediate and worthy heirs remained unknown . Verdi weakened every day and six days later, early in the morning on January 27, 1901, died.

Verdi was originally buried at the Monumental Cemetery in Milan . A month later, his body was transferred to Casa Di Riposo in Musicisti, also in Milan, in the holiday home for retired musicians, which Verdi created.

He was an agnostic. His second wife, Giuseppina Strepponi, described him as “a man of little faith” ^[14] .

Style

Verdi's predecessors who influenced his work are Rossini , Bellini , Meyerbeer and, most importantly, Donizetti . In the last two operas, Othello and Falstaff , the influence of Richard Wagner is noticeable. Respecting Gounod , whom contemporaries considered the greatest composer of the era, Verdi nevertheless did not borrow anything from the great Frenchman. Some passages in Aida indicate the composer's acquaintance with the things of Mikhail Glinka , whom Ferenc Liszt popularized in Western Europe after returning from a tour of Russia.

Throughout his career, Verdi refused to use the high “do” in tenor parts, referring to the fact that the ability to sing this particular note in front of the full hall distracted the performers both before, after, and during the performance of the note.

Despite the fact that at times Verdi’s orchestration is a workshop, the composer relied mainly on his melodic gift to express the emotions of the characters and the drama of the action. In fact, very often in Verdi's operas, especially during solo vocal performances, the harmony is intentionally ascetic, and the whole orchestra sounds like one accompaniment instrument (Verdi is attributed to the words: “The orchestra is a big guitar!” Some critics claim that Verdi paid to the technical The aspect of the score is not enough attention, because it lacked school and sophistication. Verdi himself once said, “Of all the composers, I am the most unknowing.” But he hastened to add, “I mean it seriously, but by“ knowledge ”I mean not at all knowledge of music. "

Nevertheless, it would be wrong to say that Verdi underestimated the expressive power of the orchestra and did not know how to use it to the end when he needed it. Moreover, orchestral and counterpoint innovations (for example, strings that take off according to the chromatic scale in the Monterone scene in Rigoletto, in order to emphasize the drama of the situation, or, also in Rigoletto, a choir mumbling nearby notes behind the scenes, depicting, very effectively, the approaching storm) - typical of Verdi's work - is so characteristic that other composers did not dare to borrow from him some bold tricks because of their instant recognition.

Verdi was the first composer to specifically search for such a plot for a libretto that would best suit the characteristics of his composing talent. Working in close collaboration with the librettists and knowing that dramatic expression is the main force of his talent, he sought to eliminate “unnecessary” details and “superfluous” characters from the plot, leaving only characters in which passions boil and dramatic scenes rich.

Opera

• 1. Oberto, Count of San Bonifacio (Oberto, Conte di San Bonifacio) - 1839; in 2 acts.
• 2. King for an hour (Un Giorno di Regno) - 1840; in 2 acts.
• 3. Nabucco , or Nebuchadnezzar (Nabucco) - 1842; in 4 acts.
• 4. Lombards in the first crusade (I Lombardi ') - 1843; in 4 acts. The second edition under the name Jerusalem (Jérusalem) - 1847.
• 5. Ernani (Ernani) - 1844; in 4 acts.
• 6. Two Foscari (I due Foscari) - 1844; in 3 acts.
• 7. Joan of Arc (Giovanna d'Arco) - 1845; in 3 acts with a prologue.
• 8. Alzira (Alzira) - 1845; in 2 acts with a prologue.
• 9. Attila (Attila) - 1846; in 3 acts with a prologue.
• 10. Macbeth (Macbeth) - 1847; in 4 acts. Second edition - 1865.
• 11. The robbers (I masnadieri) - 1847; in 4 acts.
• 12. Corsair (Il corsaro) - 1848; in 3 acts.
• 13. The Battle of Legnano (La battaglia di Legnano) - 1849; in 4 acts.
• 14. Louise Miller (Luisa Miller) - 1849; in 3 acts.
• 15. Stiffelio (Stiffelio) - 1850; in 3 acts. The second edition under the name Aroldo (Aroldo) - 1857; in 4 acts.
• 16. Rigoletto (Rigoletto) - 1851; in 3 acts.
• 17. Troubadour (Il Trovatore) - 1853; in 4 acts.
• 18. La Traviata - 1853; in 3 acts.
• 29. Sicilian Vespers (Les vêpres siciliennes) - 1855; in 5 acts. The second edition under the name "Giovanna de Guzmán" - 1855.
• 20. Simon Boccanegra (Simon Boccanegra) - 1857; in 3 acts with a prologue. Second edition - 1881.
• 21. Masked ball (Un ballo in maschera) - 1859; in 3 acts.
• 22. The power of fate (La forza del destino) - 1862 ; in 4 acts.

• 23. Don Carlos (Don Carlos) - 1867; in 5 acts. Second edition - 1884; in 4 acts.
• 24. Aida (Aida) - 1871; in 4 acts.
• 25. Othello (Otello) - 1887; in 4 acts.
• 26. Falstaff (Falstaff) - 1893; in 3 acts.

Other works

• String Quartet e-moll - 1873
• Requiem (Messa da Requiem) - 1874
• Four Spiritual Pieces (Quattro Pezzi Sacri) - 1892

• Bushen A., Birth of an opera. (Young Verdi). Roman, M., 1958.
• Gal G. Brahms. Wagner. Verdi. Three masters - three worlds. M., 1986.
• Ordzhonikidze G. Verdi's opera on the subjects of Shakespeare, M., 1967.
• Solovtsova L.A. J. Verdi. M., Giuseppe Verdi. Life and career, M. 1986.
• Tarozzi Giuseppe Verdi. M., 1984.
• Esa Laszlo. If Verdi kept a diary ... - Budapest, 1966.

Attention! Musical fragments in Ogg Vorbis format

• “The heart of a beautiful woman is prone to treason”, from the opera Rigoletto (See La donna è mobile )

• “Giuseppe Verdi” (known in Russian under the name “The Story of a Life”; 1938, Italy). Director - Carmine Gallone . Starring Fosco Giachetti .
• “Giuseppe Verdi” (1953, Italy). Director - Raffaello Matarazzo . Starring - Pierre Cressois .
• “The Life of Giuseppe Verdi (Verdi) ” (1982, Italy - France - Germany - Great Britain - Sweden). Director - Renato Castellani . Starring Ronald Pickup .

In sculpture

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  Verdi Memorial in Parma

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  Monument in Piazza Giuseppe Verdi, Busseto

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  Verdi Monument in Milan

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  The bust of Giuseppe Verdi by Antonio Hugo next to the Teatro Massimo in Palermo , Italy .

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  Verdi Monument in Trieste

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  Bust of Verdi in Venice

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  Bust of Verdi in San Francisco

In philately

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  USSR postage stamp dedicated to Verdi, 1963 , 4 kopecks ( TsFA 2879, Scott 2745A)

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  Postage stamp Romania, 1963

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  KMK, Russia, 2013

In astronomy

In honor of Giuseppe Verdi named a crater on Mercury .

• Summary of Verdi's operas on the site of 100 operas
• Giuseppe Verdi's life and career
• Verdi's biography and operas
• Discography of Verdi's operas
• Site about Verdi's life and work in Russian