Verdi: The Operas and Choral Works Unlocking the Masters Series by Victor Lederer

Author:Victor Lederer [Lederer, Victor]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: music appreciation, opera, music
Publisher: Amadeus Press
Published: 2014-08-01T04:00:00+00:00

8

The Late Middle Period

La forza del destino and Simon Boccanegra

The compositional period for the two operas we’ll examine in this chapter in this chapter is long, running from 1857, when Verdi wrote the first version of Simon Boccanegra to its 1881 revision. La forza del destino falls in between, with its original version dating from 1862; Verdi’s 1869 revision for La Scala in Milan has taken its place. The stylistic range covered in here is correspondingly wide.

By this time Verdi was regularly claiming to be done with writing operas; he was, at any rate, highly selective about his projects. But well-paying, prestigious commissions like that of Forza drew him out. Well known and popular, Forza is an important example of the composer’s mature style. Verdi mixes in this ambitious work the high drama of the standard operatic types that are the main characters, who have one story line, with the ordinary lives of numerous humble character roles that also populate the cast. Forza contains two huge hits (as well as many smaller ones): a wonderful overture that’s Verdi’s most popular, and the act 4 aria “Pace, pace, mio Dio” for the heroine, surely one of the greatest for soprano by this or any composer. Boccanegra, far less familiar and less approachable for most listeners, is an unusual political tale, done in an uncompromising style. Although weighed down by an overcomplicated plot, some of the characters emerge as credible and interesting. What makes Simon Boccanegra worth more than cursory auditing is the fact that it’s a lesser-known specimen of Verdi’s late style, showing the composer at his most sublime in many long passages.

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