VERDI AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES
Verdi’s mission in Italian opera--His early life and education--His
first operas and their political significance--His second period: the
maturing of his style--Crowning achievements of his third period--His
contemporaries.
I
One can hardly imagine the art of music being what it is to-day without
Bach or Mozart or Beethoven, without Monteverdi or Gluck or Wagner.
It has been said that great men sum up an epoch and inaugurate one.
Janus-like, they look at once behind and before, with glances that
survey comprehensively all that is past and pierce prophetically
the dim mists of the future. Unmistakably they point the way to the
seekers of new paths; down through the ages rings the echo of their
guiding voice in the ears of those who follow. So much is this so
that the world has come to measure a man’s greatness by the extent of
his influence on succeeding generations. The test has been applied to
Wagner and stamps him unequivocally as one of the great; but a rigid
application of the same test would seem to exclude from the immortal
ranks the commanding figure of his distinguished contemporary, Giuseppe
Verdi.
Yet, while it is still perhaps too early to ascertain Verdi’s ultimate
place in musical history, there are few to-day who would deny to him
the title of great. Undoubtedly he is the most prominent figure in
Italian music since Palestrina. The musical history of his country for
half a century is almost exclusively the narrative of his remarkable
individual achievement. Nevertheless, when he passed away, leaving to
an admiring world a splendid record of artistic accomplishment, there
remained on the musical soil of Italy no appreciable traces of his
passage. He founded no school; he left no disciples, no imitators. Of
all the younger Italians who aspired to inherit his honored mantle
there is not one in whom we can point to any specific signs of his
influence. Even his close friend and collaborator, Boïto, was drawn
from his side by the compelling magnetism of the creator of _Tristan_.
Some influence, of course, must inevitably have emanated from him;
but it was no greater apparently than that exercised even by mediocre
artistic personalities upon those with whom they come immediately in
contact. It is curious to note, in contrast, the influence on the
younger Italians of Ponchielli, a lesser genius, and one is inclined to
wonder why ‘the noblest Roman of them all’ inspired no one to follow in
his footsteps.
The reason, however, is not far to seek. Verdi was no innovator, no
explorer of fresh fields. He had not the passionate desire that Wagner
had for a new and more adequate form of expression. The fierce contempt
for conventional limitations so common to genius in all ages was
unknown to him. Verdi was temperamentally the most _bourgeois_ of great
artists. He was conservative, prudent, practical, and self-contained.
The appearance of eccentricity was distasteful to him. He had a proper
respect for established traditions and no ambition to overturn them.
The art forms he inherited appeared to him quite adequate to his
purposes, and in the beginning of his career he seems to have had no
greater desire than to imitate the dramatic successes of Rossini,
Mercadante, and Bellini. His growth was perfectly natural, spontaneous,
unconscious. He towered above his predecessors because he was
altogether a bigger man--more intelligent, more intense, more sincere,
and more vital. He was not conscious of the need for a more logical
art form than the Italian opera of his time, and unquestioningly he
poured his inspiration into the conventional molds; but as time went on
his sure dramatic instinct unconsciously shaped these into a vehicle
suitable to the expression of his genius. It thus became the real
mission of Verdi to develop and synthesize into a homogeneous art form
the various contradictory musical and dramatic influences to which he
fell heir; and, having done that, his work was finished, nor was there
anything left for another to add.
The influences which Verdi inherited were sufficiently complex. The
ideals of Gluck and Mozart were strangely diluted by Rossini with the
inanities of the concert-opera school, of which Sacchini, Paesiello,
Jommelli, and Cimarosa were leading exponents. _Il Barbiere_, it
is true, is refreshingly Mozartian and _Tell_ is infused with the
romantic spirit of Weber and Auber; but even these are not entirely
free from the vapidity of the Neapolitans. With Rossini’s followers,
Bellini, Donizetti, and Mercadante, Italian opera shows retrogression
rather than advance, though _Norma_ is obviously inspired by _Tell_
and _La Favorita_ is not lacking in traces of Meyerbeer. The truth
is that Italian opera during the first few decades of the nineteenth
century was suffering from an epidemic of anæmia. It was not devoid of
spontaneity, of inspiration, of facile grace; but it was languid and
lackadaisical; it was like the drooping society belle of the period,
with her hothouse pallor, her tight corsets and fainting spells and
smelling salts. To save it from degenerating into imbecility there was
necessary the advent of an unsophisticated personality dowered with
robust sincerity, with full-blooded force and virility. And fortunately
just such a savior appeared in the person of Giuseppe Verdi.
The career of Verdi is in many ways the most remarkable in musical
history. None other covers such an extended period of productive
activity; none other shows such a very gradual and constant
development; none other delayed so long its full fruition. Had Verdi
died or stopped writing at the same age as did Mozart, Beethoven,
Weber, Schubert, or Schumann--to mention only a few--his name would be
to us merely that of a delightful melodist whose genius reached its
fullest expression in _Rigoletto_ and the _Traviata_. He would rank
perhaps with Rossini and Donizetti--certainly not higher. But at an age
which is usually considered beyond the limit of actual achievement he
gave to the world the crowning masterpieces which as far surpass the
creations of his prime as _Tristan_ and _Die Meistersinger_ surpass
_Das Liebesverbot_ and _Rienzi_.
II
Giuseppe Fortunino Verdi was born on October 10, 1813, in the little
village of Le Roncole, about three miles from Busseto. His parents were
Carlo Verdi and Luigia Utini, peasants and innkeepers of Le Roncole.
Happily, the narrative of Verdi’s early years is comparatively free
from the wealth of strange and wonderful legends that cluster like
barnacles around the childhood of nearly every genius. There was
something exceptional, however, in the sympathetic readiness with
which the untutored innkeeper encouraged his son’s taste for music by
the gift of a spinet and in the eager assiduity with which the child
devoted himself to the instrument. In encouraging his son’s taste for
music it was the far-fetched dream of Carlo Verdi that the boy might
some day become organist of the church of Le Roncole. At the age of
eleven Verdi justified his father’s hopes. Meantime he went to school
at Busseto and subsequently became an office boy in the wholesale
grocery house of one Antonio Barezzi.
Barezzi was a cultivated man. He played with skill upon the flute,
clarinet, French horn, and ophicleide, and he was president of the
local Philharmonic Society, which held its meetings and rehearsals
at his house. There Verdi’s talent was recognized by the conductor
Provesi, who after a few years put the young man in his place as
conductor of the Philharmonic Society and frequently used him as his
substitute at the organ of the cathedral.
Eventually, however, Verdi exhausted the musical possibilities of
Busseto, and his loyal friends, Barezzi and Provesi, decided that he
should go to Milan. Through the influence of Barezzi he was awarded one
of the bursaries of the _Monte di Pietà_,[120] and, as this was not
sufficient to cover all his expenses, the good Barezzi advanced him
money out of his own pocket.
Verdi arrived in Milan in June, 1832, and at once made application in
writing for admission as a paying pupil at the Conservatory. He also
went through what he afterward called ‘a sort of examination.’ One
learns without surprise that he was not admitted. The reason for his
rejection is one of those profound academic secrets about which the
world is perfectly unconcerned. He was simply advised by Provesi’s
friend, Rolla, a master at the Conservatory, to choose a teacher in the
town, and accordingly he chose Vincenzo Lavigna. With him Verdi made
rapid progress and gained a valuable practical familiarity with the
technique of dramatic composition. From this period date many forgotten
compositions, including pianoforte pieces, marches, overtures,
serenades, cantatas, a _Stabat Mater_ and other efforts. Some of these
were written for the Philharmonic Society of Busseto and some were
performed at La Scala at the benefit concerts for the _Pio Istituto
Teatrale_. Several of them were utilized by Verdi in the scores of his
earlier operas.
From 1833-36 Verdi was _maestro di musica_ of Busseto. During that
time he wrote a large amount of church music, besides marches for
the _banda_ (town band) and overtures for the orchestra of the
Philharmonic. Except as preparatory exercises, none of these has any
particular value. The most important event of those three years was
Verdi’s marriage to Margarita Barezzi, daughter of the enlightened
grocer who so ably deputized Providence in shaping the great composer’s
career. This marriage seems to have kindled a new ambition in Verdi,
and as soon as the conditions of his contract with the municipality of
Busseto were fulfilled he returned to Milan, taking with him his wife,
two young children and the completed score of a musical melodrama,
entitled _Oberto, Conte di San Bonifacio_, of which he had copied all
the parts, both vocal and instrumental, with his own hand.
Verdi returned to Milan under most promising auspices, having already
attracted the favorable notice of some of the leading social and
artistic factors of that musical city. A few years before, when
he was studying in Milan, there existed a society of rich musical
_dilettanti_, called the _Società Filodrammatica_, which included
such exalted personages as Count Renato Borromeo, the Duke Visconti,
and Count Pompeo Belgiojoso, and was directed by a _maestro_ named
Masini. The society held weekly artistic meetings in the hall of the
Teatro Filodrammatico, which it owned, and, at the time we speak of,
was engaged in preparing Haydn’s ‘Creation’ for performance. Verdi
distinguished himself by conducting the performance of that work,
in place of the absent _maestri_. Soon afterward Count Borromeo
commissioned Verdi to write the music for a cantata for voice and
orchestra on the occasion of the marriage of some member of his family,
and this commission was followed by an invitation to write an opera for
the Philodramatic Theatre. The libretto furnished by Masini was altered
by Temistocle Solera--a very remarkable young poet, with whom Verdi had
cultivated a close friendship--and became _Oberto di San Bonifacio_.
III
This was the opera with which Verdi landed in Milan in 1838. Masini,
unfortunately, was no longer director of the Philodramatic Theatre, but
he promised to obtain for _Oberto_ a representation at La Scala. In
this he was assured the support of Count Borromeo and other influential
members of the Philodramatic, but, beyond a few commonplace words of
recommendation--as Verdi afterward remarked--the noble gentlemen did
not exert themselves. Masini, however, succeeded in making arrangements
to have _Oberto_ produced in the spring of 1839. The illness of one of
the principal singers set all his plans awry; but Bartolomeo Merelli,
who was then _impresario_ of La Scala, was so much impressed with the
possibilities of the opera that he decided to put it on at his own
expense, agreeing to divide with Verdi whatever price the latter might
realize from the sale of the score.[121] _Oberto_ was produced on the
seventeenth of November, 1839, and met with a modest success. Merelli
then commissioned Verdi to write within two years three operas which
were to be produced at La Scala or at the Imperial Theatre of Vienna.
None of the librettos supplied by Merelli appealed to Verdi; but
finally he chose what appeared to him the best of a bad lot. This was
a work in the comic vein, called _Il Finto Stanislao_ and renamed by
Verdi _Un Giorno di Regno_.
It was the supreme irony of fate that set Verdi just then to the
composition of a comic opera. Poverty, sickness, and death in rapid
succession darkened that period of his life. Between April and June,
1840, he lost, one after the other, his baby boy, his little girl,
and his beloved wife. And he was supposed to write a comic opera! _Un
Giorno di Regno_ naturally did not succeed, and, feeling thoroughly
disheartened by his successive misfortunes, Verdi resolved to abandon a
musical career. From this slough of despond he was finally drawn some
months later by the attraction of a libretto, written by his friend
Solera, which Merelli had succeeded in inducing him to read. It was
_Nabucco_.[122]
The opera _Nabucco_ was finished in the fall of 1841 and was produced
at La Scala on March 9, 1842. Its success was unprecedented. The first
performance was attended by scenes of the wildest and most fervent
enthusiasm. So unusually vociferous was the demonstration, even for
an Italian theatre, that Verdi at first thought the audience was
making fun of him. _Nabucco_, however, was a real sensation. It had a
dramatic fire and energy, a massiveness of treatment, a richness of
orchestral and choral color that were new to the Italians. The chorus
of the Scala had to be specially augmented to achieve its magnificent
effects. Somewhat crude it was, no doubt, but it possessed life and
force--qualities of which the Italian stage was then sorely in need.
One is amused at this date to read the complaints of an eminent English
critic--Henry Fothergill Chorley of the _Athenæeum_, to wit--touching
its noisiness, its ‘immoderate employment of brass instruments,’ and
its lack of melody. Familiar charges! To the Italians _Nabucco_ was
the ideal of what a tragic music drama should be, and certainly it
approached that ideal more nearly than any opera that had appeared in
years.[123]
The great success of _Nabucco_ placed Verdi at once on an equal footing
with Donizetti, Mercadante, Pacini, Ricci, and the other musical idols
of contemporary Italy. The management of La Scala commissioned him to
write the _opera d’obbligo_[124] for the grand season of the Carnival,
and Merelli gave him a blank contract to sign upon his own terms.
Verdi’s demands were sufficiently moderate, and within eleven months he
had handed to the management of La Scala the completed score of a new
opera, _I Lombardi alla Prima Crociata_.
With _I Lombardi_ began Verdi’s long and troublesome experience with
the Austrian censorship. The time was almost ripe for the political
awakening of Lombardo-Venetia, and some of the patriotic feeling which
Verdi, consciously or unconsciously, expressed in _Nabucco_ had touched
an answering chord in the spirit of the Milanese which was partly
responsible for the enthusiasm with which the opera was received. Such
demonstrations were little to the taste of the Austrians, and when _I
Lombardi_ was announced they were prepared to edit it into complete
political innocuousness. Accordingly, in response to an ill-tempered
letter from Cardinal Gaisruk, Archbishop of Milan, drawing attention
to the supposed presence in _I Lombardi_ of several objectionable and
sacrilegious incidents, the director of police, Torresani, notified
the management of La Scala that the opera could not be produced without
important changes. After much discussion Torresani finally announced
that, as he was ‘never a person to cut the wings of a young artist,’
the opera might go on provided the words _Salve Maria_ were substituted
for _Ave Maria_.[125]
_I Lombardi_ was produced in February, 1843, and met with a reception
rivalling that which greeted _Nabucco_. As in the case of the latter
opera a certain amount of this excitement was political--the audiences
reading into many of the passages a patriotic meaning which may or
may not have been intended. The chorus, _O Signore, dal tetto natio_,
was the signal for a tremendous demonstration similar to that which
had been aroused by the words, _O, mia patria, si bella e perduta_ in
_Nabucco_. Additional political significance was lent to the occasion
by the interference of the police to prevent the repetition of the
quintet. In truth, Verdi owed much of his extraordinary success of his
early operas to his lucky coincidence with the awakening patriotic and
revolutionary sentiment of the Italian people. He put into fervent,
blood-stirring music the thoughts and aspirations which they dared not
as yet express in words and deeds. We cannot believe that he did this
altogether unconsciously, for he was much too near the soil and the
hearts of the people of Italy not to feel with them and in a measure
express them. Indeed, as he himself acknowledged, it was among the
common people that his work first met with sympathy and understanding.
After the success of _I Lombardi_ Verdi was beset with requests for
a new work from all the leading opera houses in Italy. He finally
made a contract with the Fenice in Venice and chose for his subject
Victor Hugo’s drama _Ernani_, from which a mediocre libretto was
arranged at his request by a mediocre poet named Francesco Maria
Piave. The subject appealed strongly to Verdi and resulted in a score
that was a decided advance on _Nabucco_ and _I Lombardi_. It brought
Verdi again into collision with the Austrian police, who insisted on
certain modifications; but, in spite of careful censorship, it still
furnished an opportunity for patriotic demonstrations on the part of
the Venetians, who read a political significance into the chorus, _Si
ridesti il Leon di Castiglia_. Under the circumstances one cannot say
to what extent, if any, the artistic appeal of _Ernani_ was responsible
for the enthusiasm which greeted its _première_ at La Fenice on March
9, 1844. Some of the other Italian cities--notably Florence--received
it coolly enough; but, on the whole it was very successful in Italy.
Abroad the impression it produced was less favorable. It was the first
Verdi opera to be given in London, where Lumley opened the season of
1845 with it at Her Majesty’s Theatre. The manner of its reception may
be described in the words of a contemporary wag, who declared after
the performance: ‘Well, the “I don’t knows” have it.’ In Paris it was
presented at the Théâtre Italien, in January, 1846, but, owing to the
excusably strenuous objections of Victor Hugo, its name was changed to
_Il Proscritto_ and the name of its characters were also altered. Hugo
did not admire Piave’s version of his drama; neither did it succeed
with the Parisian public.
Verdi’s next effort was _I due Foscari_, a long-winded melodrama
constructed by Piave, which was produced in 1844, and received without
enthusiasm. Its merit is far below that of its three immediate
predecessors; nor was its successor, _Giovanna d’Arco_, of much more
value, though it had the advantage of a good poem written by Solera.
_Giovanna d’Arco_ was followed, respectively, by _Alzira_ and _Attila_,
neither of which attained or deserved much success. Great enthusiasm,
it is true, marked the reception of _Attila_ in Italy, but it is
attributable almost solely to the susceptible patriotic fervor of the
people, who were aroused to almost frantic demonstrations by such
lines as _Avrai tu l’universo, resti l’Italia me_. In London _Attila_
attracted to the box-office the magnificent sum of forty dollars,
though in Paris a fragment of the work produced what was described
as ‘a startling effect,’ through the medium of the statuesque Sophie
Cruvelli.[126]
Yet during all this time Verdi was advancing, as it were, under cover.
His failures were not the result of any decline in his powers. They
showed no loss of the vigor and vitality that gave life to _Nabucco_,
_I Lombardi_, and _Ernani_. Simply, they were less felicitous, but no
less the crude and forceful efforts of a strong man not yet trained
to the effective use of his own strength. Some of their defects,
too, were no doubt due to the poverty of the libretti, for Verdi was
essentially a dramatic genius, dependent for inspiration largely upon
the situations with which he was supplied. Certainly the quality of
his works seems to vary precisely with the quality of their libretti.
Thus, _Macbeth_, an adaptation of Shakespeare’s tragedy, made by Piave,
proved a distinct advance on its immediate predecessor, _Attila_--even
though Piave did not improve on Shakespeare. It was produced at La
Pergola, Florence, on March 14, 1847, with complete success. Like so
many other Verdi operas, ‘Macbeth’ provided an excuse for patriotic
demonstrations, and in Venice the Austrian soldiery had to be summoned
to quell the riotous and seditious excitement aroused by Palma’s
singing of the verse:
_La patria tradita
Piangendo c’invita
Fratelli, gli oppressi
Corriamo a salvar._
‘Macbeth’ was followed by _I Masnadieri_, which was written for the
stage of Her Majesty’s Theatre, London. It was originally intended that
Verdi should write an opera for the English stage on the subject of
King Lear, and it is to be regretted that circumstances prevented him
from carrying out his project, for he seems to have found a special
inspiration in the Shakespearean drama. The libretto of _I Masnadieri_
was written by Andrea Maffei, but that excellent poet had the bad
judgment to single out for treatment _Die Räuber_ of Schiller, which
had already been shamefully mauled and mangled by other librettists. It
was a complete failure in London, where Verdi himself conducted it; it
also was a complete failure everywhere else.
Notwithstanding this Verdi was offered the post of _chef d’orchestre_
at Her Majesty’s Theatre, but had to refuse because of contract
engagements. His next two operas were mere hack work--_Il Corsaro_
and _La Battaglia di Legnano_. The latter, being a deliberate attempt
to dramatize a revolution rather than to express the feelings that
underlie revolutions, was an artistic failure.
IV
With _Luisa Miller_ begins what is usually known as Verdi’s second
period--the period in which he shook himself free from the grandiose
bombast, from which none of his earlier works is entirely free. In this
so-called second period he becomes more restrained, more coherent,
more _net_; he leans somewhat more to the suave _cantabile_ of
Bellini and Donizetti, a little more--if the truth be told--to the
trite and mawkish. Cammarano fashioned the libretto of _Luisa Miller_
from Schiller’s immature _Kabale und Liebe_. It was a moderately good
libretto and moderately good, perhaps, sufficiently describes the music
which Verdi wrote to it. _Stiffelio_, a work of little merit, with a
poem by Piave, was the next product of Verdi’s second manner. It was
given without success at the Grand Theatre, Trieste, in November, 1850.
After _Stiffelio_, however, there came in rapid succession from Verdi’s
pen three works whose enormous success consummated his fame and whose
melodiousness has since reëchoed continuously from every opera stage
and street organ in the universe. When _Stiffelio_ was produced he was
under contract with the _impresario_ Lasina to write an opera for the
Fenice of Venice. At his request Piave again made free with Victor
Hugo, choosing this time the unsavory melodrama, _Le roi s’amuse_,
which he adopted under the title of _La Maledizione_. When the Italian
police got wind of the project, however, there was serious trouble.
_Le roi s’amuse_ contains some implied animadversions on the morals
of royalty, and the censorship absolutely forbade the appearance in
Italy of such an iniquitous trifling with a sacrosanct subject. Verdi,
who possessed a generous share of obstinacy, refused to write an opera
on any other subject, to the despair of the Fenice management who had
promised the Venetians a new opera by the illustrious _maestro_. A
way out of the _impasse_ was finally found by a commissary of police
named Martello, who advised some substitution in the names of the
characters--such as the duke of Mantua for the king--and also suggested
the title _Rigoletto, Buffone di Corte_. These suggestions proved
acceptable to Verdi and within forty days the score of _Rigoletto_ was
written and orchestrated from first note to last. Its _première_, on
March 11, 1851, was an unqualified success. The too famous _canzone_,
‘_La donna e mobile_,’ caused a sensation which was so accurately
foreseen by the composer that he would not put it to paper until a few
hours before the performance. _Rigoletto_ was presented at the Italian
Opera, Covent Garden, London, in the season of 1853 and at the Théâtre
Italien, Paris, on January 17, 1857. Its London reception was very
cordial.
Certainly _Rigoletto_ marks a decided advance on its predecessors.
It is simpler in design, more economical of material, more logically
developed and dramatically more legitimate--notwithstanding such
puerilities as Gilda’s eccentric and irrelevant aria in the garden
scene. There are present also signs which seem to indicate the
influence of Meyerbeer; but it is difficult to trace specific
influences in the work of a man of such absorbing individuality as
Verdi.
After _Rigoletto_ came _Il Trovatore_, which was produced at the
Apollo Theatre, Rome, on January 19, 1853, and was received with
extraordinary enthusiasm. From Rome it spread like wildfire throughout
Italy, everywhere achieving an overwhelming success. In Naples three
houses gave the opera at about the same time. Soon all the capitals
in Europe were humming its ingratiating melodies. Paris saw it at the
Théâtre Italien in December, 1854; London at Covent Garden in May,
1855--even Germany extended to it a warm and smiling welcome. Truly,
_Il Trovatore_ is, to an extent, unique in operatic annals. It probably
enjoys the distinction of being the most popular and least intelligible
opera ever written. The rambling and inchoate libretto was made by
Cammarano from _El Trovador_ of the Spanish dramatist, Antonio Garcia
Gultierez, and nobody has ever lived who could give a succinct and
lucid exposition of its story. For that reason probably the work as a
whole is such as to deserve the name of ‘a concert in costume,’ which
someone has aptly applied to it. Verdi could not possibly have woven a
dramatic score of consistent texture round such a literary nightmare.
What he did do was to write a number of very pleasing solos, duets,
and trios, together with some theatrical and ingratiating orchestral
music. Anyone inclined to question the theatricalism of the score may
be interested in comparing the ‘Anvil Chorus’ of _Il Trovatore_ with
the ‘Forging of the Sword’ episode in _Siegfried_. Still, one cannot
deny distinct merit to a work which has held a place in the affections
of millions of people for more than half a century. Its amazing
popularity when it first spread contagiously over Europe aroused a
storm of critical comment which reads amusingly at this day. In the
eyes of Verdi’s enthusiastic protagonists _Il Trovatore_ naturally
marked the zenith of operatic achievement, while his antagonists placed
it unequivocally at the nadir of uninspired and commonplace triviality.
_La Traviata_ sounds like a feminine counterpart of _Il Trovatore_,
which it followed and with which it has been so often associated on
operatic bills. The two works, however, are drawn from widely different
sources and are about as dissimilar in every way as any other two
operas of Verdi which might be mentioned. Piave made the libretto of
_La Traviata_ from _La Dame aux Camélias_ of Alexandre Dumas, _fils_.
The subject does not appear to be an ideal one for musical treatment;
but it is of a style which seems to have a peculiar appeal to
composers, as witness _Bohème_, _Sappho_, _Manon_, and many others. One
is inclined to award to the _Traviata_ a very high place among Verdi’s
works. It stands alone among them, absolutely different in style and
manner from anything else he has done. There is in it a simplicity, a
sparkle, a grace, a feminine daintiness, an enticing languor, a spirit
quite thoroughly Gallic, suggesting, as Barevi has observed, the
style of the _opéra comique_ (_cf._ Chap. I). _La Traviata_, produced
at Venice in 1853, was a flat failure, partly owing to the general
incapacity of the cast; about a year later, with some changes, it was
reproduced in Venice and proved a brilliant success.
Two years of silence followed _La Traviata_. During that time Verdi
was engaged on a work which the management of the Paris Opera--passing
over Auber, Berlioz, and Halévy--had commissioned him to write for
the Universal Exhibition of 1855. The libretto was made by Scribe and
Duveyrier and dealt with the sanguinary episode of the French-Italian
war of 1282, known as the Sicilian Vespers--a peculiar subject to
select under the circumstances. After an amount of delay, caused by
the eccentric disappearance of the beautiful Sophie Cruvelli, idol
of contemporary Paris, _Les Vêpres Siciliennes_ was produced at the
Opéra in 1855. It was received with great enthusiasm, but did not
outlive the popularity of its first prima donna. It was followed by
_Simon Boccanegra_, composed to a poem adapted by Piave from Schiller’s
_Fieschi_, which, produced at the Fenice, Venice, in 1857, with little
success, was later revised by that excellent poet, Arrigo Boïto, and,
with the music recast by Verdi, was received at La Scala, Milan, in
1881 with distinct favor.
Verdi’s next opera, _Un Ballo in Maschera_, has a peculiar history,
turning on the curious interaction of art and politics which is such
a feature of Verdi’s career. It was adapted from the ‘Gustave III’ of
Scribe, which Auber had already set to music for the Paris Opera, and
was at first entitled _La Vendetta in Domino_. Written for the San
Carlo Theatre, Naples, it was about to be put into rehearsal when word
arrived of the attempted assassination of Napoleon III by Orsini. The
Italian police, morbidly sensitive in such matters, at once forbade the
representation of _Un Ballo in Maschera_ without radical modifications,
and Verdi, with his customary obstinacy, emphatically refused to
make any alteration whatsoever. Even when the San Carlo management
instituted a civil action against him for two hundred thousand francs
Verdi declined to budge. He was openly supported in his attitude by the
entire population of Naples, which greeted his appearance everywhere
with enthusiastic shouts of _Viva Verdi!_. Eventually, feeling that the
affair would create a revolution on its own account, the authorities
requested Verdi to take himself and his opera out of Naples. The opera
was then secured by Jacovacci, the famous _impresario_ of the Apollo
Theatre in Rome, who swore he would present it in that city at any
cost. ‘I shall arrange with the censure, with the cardinal-governor,
with St. Peter if necessary,’ he said. ‘Within a week, my dear
_maestro_, you shall have the libretto, with all the _visas_ and all
the _buon per la scena_ possible.’ Nevertheless the papal government
did not prove so tractable, and, before _Un Ballo in Maschera_ could
appear in Rome the scene of the action had to be shifted from Sweden
to America and the character of Gustave III transmogrified into the
Earl of Warwick, Governor of Boston! Indifferent to historic accuracy,
however, Rome received the opera with enthusiasm, when it was produced
in February, 1859. Upon the occasion of its presentation at the
Théâtre Italien, Paris, on January 13, 1861, the scene was shifted to
the kingdom of Naples--where it still remains--because Mario refused
to wear the costume of a New England Puritan at the beginning of the
eighteenth century. _Un Ballo in Maschera_ was given in London in 1861
and was received very cordially.
It is, in effect, one of the most mature works of Verdi’s second
manner. Still more mature and suggestive of what was to come is _La
Forza del Destino_, which was written for the Imperial Theatre of St.
Petersburg, and was produced there on November 10, 1862, encountering
merely a _succès d’estime_. Repellantly gloomy and gruesome is the
story of _La Forza del Destino_, adapted by Piave from _Don Alvar_,
a tragedy in the exaggerated French romantic vein by Don Angel de
Saavedra. The oppressive libretto perhaps accounted in large measure
for the lack of success which attended the opera, not only in St.
Petersburg, but in Milan, where it was produced at La Scala in 1869,
and in Paris where the Théâtre Italien staged it in 1876. Yet _La
Forza del Destino_ contains some of the most powerful, passionate
and poignant music that Verdi ever wrote, and one can see in it more
clearly than in any of his other works suggestions of that complete
maturity of genius which was to blossom forth in _Aïda_, _Otello_, and
_Falstaff_.[127]
Notwithstanding the indifferent reception accorded _Les Vêpres
Siciliennes_ in Paris, the management of the opera again approached
Verdi when a new gala piece was needed for the Universal Exhibition of
1866. The opera management was singularly unfortunate in its experience
with Verdi. For this occasion the composer was supplied by Méry and
Camille du Locle with an indifferent libretto called _Don Carlos_, and
he was unable to rise above its level.
V
_Don Carlos_, however, was but the darkness before the dawn of a
new period more brilliant and glorious than was dreamed of even by
those of Verdi’s admirers who did him highest reverence. At that time
Wagner had not yet come into his own, and, in the eyes of the world
at large Verdi stood absolutely without peer among living composers.
Consequently, when Ismaïl Pasha, Khedive of Egypt, wished to add lustre
to the beautiful opera houses he had built in Cairo he could think
of nothing more desirable for the purpose than a new work from the
pen of the great Italian. That nothing might be wanting to make such
an event a memorable triumph, Mariette Bey, the distinguished French
Egyptologist, sketched out, as a subject for the proposed work, a
stirring, colorful story, recalling vividly the picturesque glories of
ancient Egypt. This story set fire to Verdi’s imagination. Under his
direction a libretto in French prose was made from Mariette’s sketch
by Camille du Locle and done into Italian verse by A. Ghislanzoni.
So ardently did Verdi become enamoured of the work that within a few
months he had handed to Ismaïl Pasha the completed score of _Aïda_.
The opera was to be performed at the end of 1870, but owing to a
number of causes--including the imprisonment of the scenery within
the walls of Paris by the besieging Germans--its performance was
delayed for a year. It was finally given on December 24, 1871, before
a brilliant cosmopolitan audience and amid scenes of the most intense
enthusiasm.[128] The success of _Aïda_ was overwhelming; nor was it
due, as in the case of so many other Verdi operas, to causes extraneous
to the work itself. Milan, which heard _Aïda_ on February 7, 1872,
received it with an applause which rivalled in spontaneous fervor the
enthusiasm of Cairo, and the verdict of Milan has been emphatically
endorsed by every important opera house in the world. Within three
years, beginning on April 22, 1876, the Théâtre Italien presented
it sixty-eight times to appreciative Parisian audiences, and later,
at the Opéra, its reception was still enthusiastic. England, hitherto
characteristically somewhat cold to Verdi, greeted _Aïda_ warmly when
it was given at Covent Garden in 1876, and bestowed upon the work the
full measure of its critical approval.
[Illustration: Giuseppe Verdi]
_Aïda_ was the storm centre around which raged the first controversy
touching the alleged influence of Wagner on Verdi. In _Aïda_,
apparently, we find all the identifying features of the modern
music-drama as modelled by Wagner. There is the broad declamation, the
dramatic realism and coherence, the solid, powerful instrumentation,
the deposition of the voice from its commanding position as the
all-important vehicle, the employment of the orchestra as the principal
exponent of color, character, expression--putting the statue in the
orchestra and leaving the pedestal on the stage, as Grétry said of
Mozart. Yet, in spite of all this, in spite of much specious critical
reasoning to the contrary, _Aïda_ is altogether Verdi, and there is in
it of Wagner not a jot, not a tittle! It is, of course, impossible to
suppose that Verdi was unacquainted with Wagner’s works, and equally
impossible to suppose that he remained unimpressed by them. But Verdi’s
was emphatically not the type of mind to borrow from any other. He was
an exceptionally introspective, self-centred and self-sufficient man.
Besides, he was concerned with the development of the Italian lyric
drama purely according to Italian taste, and in directions which he
himself had followed more or less strictly from the beginning of his
career. From the propaganda of Wagner he must inevitably have absorbed
some pregnant suggestions as to musical dramatics, particularly as
Wagner was in that respect the voice of the _zeitgeist_; but of
specific Wagnerian influence in his music there is absolutely no trace.
Anyone who follows the development of Verdi’s genius from _Nabucco_
can see in _Aïda_ its logical maturing. No elements appear in the
latter opera which are not appreciable in embryo in the former--between
them lies simply thirty years of study, knowledge and experiment.
During a period of enforced leisure in 1873 Verdi wrote a string
quartet, the only chamber music work that ever came from his fertile
pen. His friend, the noble and illustrious Manzoni, passed away in
the same year, and Verdi proposed to honor his memory by composing
a _requiem_ to be performed on the first anniversary of his death.
The municipality of Milan entered into the project to the extent of
planning an elaborate public presentation of the work at the expense of
the city. Verdi had already composed a _Libera me_ for a mass which,
in accordance with a suggestion made by him to Tito Ricordi, was to be
written in honor of Rossini by the leading composers of Italy. For some
undiscovered reason or reasons this mass was never given. The _Libera
me_ which Verdi wrote for it, however, served as a foundation for the
new mass in memory of Manzoni. On May 22, 1874, the Manzoni _Requiem_
was given at the church of San Marco, Milan, in the presence of
musicians and _dilettanti_ from all over Europe. Later it was presented
to enthusiastic audiences at La Scala, at one of the _Matinées
Spirituelles_ of the Salle Favart, Paris, and at the Royal Albert Hall,
London.
Hans von Bülow, with Teutonic emphasis, has characterized the _Requiem_
as a ‘monstrosity.’ While the description is perhaps extreme, it
is, from one point of view, not altogether unjustified. Certainly a
German critic, having in mind the magnificent classic structures of
Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven, could hardly look with tolerance upon
this colorful expression of southern genius. The Manzoni _Requiem_
is, in fact, a complete contradiction of itself, and as such can
hardly be termed a successful artistic achievement. The odor of the
_coulisses_ rather than that of the sanctuary hangs heavily about it.
But, if one can forget that it is a mass and listen to it simply as a
piece of music, then the _Requiem_ stands revealed for what it is--a
touching, noble, and profound expression of love and sorrow for a
friend departed. This is Verdi’s only important essay in sacred music,
though mention may be made of his colorful and dramatic _Stabat Mater_,
written in 1898.
A five-act opera entitled _Montezuma_ which Verdi wrote in 1878 may
be passed over with the remark that it was produced in that year at
La Scala, Milan. Then for nearly ten years Verdi was silent. The
world was content to believe that his silence was permanent, that
the marvellously productive career of the great master had come to a
glorious and fitting close in _Aïda_ and the _Requiem_. Nobody then
could have believed that _Aïda_, far from making the culmination of
Verdi’s achievement, was but the beginning of a new period in which
his genius rose to heights that dwarfed even the loftiest eminence
of his heyday. There is nothing in the history of art that can
parallel the final flight of this man, at an age when the wings of
creative inspiration have usually withered into impotence, or crumbled
into dust. Under the circumstances one can, of course, very easily
overestimate the æsthetic value of the last works of Verdi, surrounded
as they are in one’s imagination with the halo which the venerable
age of their creator has inevitably lent to them. As a matter of
fact, the ultimate place of Verdi’s last works in musical history it
is not within our power to determine. The mighty weapon of popular
approval--which bestows the final accolade or delivers the last
damning thrust, according to one’s point of view--has as yet missed
both _Otello_ and _Falstaff_. Critics differ, as critics will and ever
did. Musically, dramatically, formally, and technically _Otello_ and
_Falstaff_ are the most finished examples of operatic composition
that Italy has ever given to the world; and even outside Italy--if
one excepts the masterpieces of Wagner--it is doubtful if they can be
paralleled. Whether, also, they possess the divine spark which alone
gives immortality is a moot point. We cannot say.
The goddess of fortune, who on the whole kept ever close to Verdi’s
side, secured for him in his culminating efforts the collaboration of
Arrigo Boïto, a poet and musician of exceptional gifts. Undoubtedly
Boïto made very free with Shakespeare in his libretto of _Otello_,
but, compared with previous attempts to adapt Shakespeare for operatic
purposes, his version is an absolute masterpiece. Even more remarkable,
and much more faithful to the original, is his version of _Falstaff_,
which, taken by and large, is probably the only perfect opera libretto
ever written. _Otello_ is a story which might be expected to find
perfect understanding and sympathy in the mind and temperament of an
Italian, and consequently the faithful preservation of the original
spirit is not so remarkable; but that an Italian should succeed in
retaining through the change of language the thoroughly English flavor
of _Falstaff_ is truly extraordinary.
_Otello_ was produced on February 5, 1887, at La Scala, Milan. That it
was a brilliant success is not artistically very significant. Verdi to
the Milanese was something less than a god and more than a composer.
Its first performance at the Lyceum Theatre, London, in July, 1889, and
at the Paris Opéra on October 12, 1894, were both gala occasions, and
the enthusiasm which greeted it may safely be interpreted in part as
a personal tribute to the venerable composer. Outside of such special
occasions, and in the absence of the leather-lunged Tamagno, _Otello_
has always been received with curiosity, with interest, with respect,
with admiration, but without enthusiasm and, generally speaking,
without appreciation. A certain few there are whose appreciative love
of the work is fervent and sincere; but the attitude of the public at
large toward _Otello_ is not sympathetic.
Much the same may be said of the public attitude toward
_Falstaff_--though the public, for some reason difficult to fathom, is
provided with comparatively few opportunities of becoming familiar with
this greatest of all Verdi’s creations. Excepting _Die Meistersinger_
and _Le Nozze di Figaro_ there is nothing in the literature of
comic opera that can compare with _Falstaff_, and in its dazzling,
dancing exuberance of youth and wit and gaiety it stands quite alone.
‘_Falstaff_,’ says Richard Strauss, ‘is the greatest masterpiece
of modern Italian music. It is a work in which Verdi attained real
artistic perfection.’ ‘The action in _Falstaff_,’ James Huneker writes,
‘is almost as rapid as if the text were spoken; and the orchestra--the
wittiest and most sparkling _riant_ orchestra I ever heard--comments
upon the monologue and dialogue of the book. When the speech becomes
rhetorical so does the orchestra. It is heightened speech and instead
of melody of the antique, formal pattern we hear the endless melody
which Wagner employs. But Verdi’s speech is his own and does not
savor of Wagner. If the ideas are not developed and do not assume
vaster proportions it is because of their character. They could not
be so treated without doing violence to the sense of proportion.
Classic purity in expression, Latin exuberance, joyfulness, and an
inexpressibly delightful atmosphere of irresponsible youthfulness
and gaiety are all in this charming score....’ Nowhere in _Falstaff_
do we find the slightest suggestion of Wagner. Its spirit is much
more that of Mozart. Naturally it invites comparison both with _Die
Meistersinger_ and with _Figaro_, but the comparison in either case is
futile. In form and content _Falstaff_ is absolutely _sui generis_.
La Scala, which witnessed the first Verdi triumph, also witnessed
his last. _Falstaff_ had its _première_ there on February 9, 1893,
in the presence of ‘the best elements in music, art, politics and
society,’ to quote a contemporary correspondent of the London _Daily
Graphic_. The audience, so we are informed, grew wildly riotous in its
enthusiasm. Even the ‘best elements’ so far forgot themselves as to wax
demonstrative; while that part of the population of Milan which was
not included in the audience held a demonstration of its own after the
performance in front of Verdi’s hotel, forcing the aged composer to
spend most of the night walking back and forth between his apartment
and the balcony that he might listen to reiterated appreciations of
an opera which the majority of the demonstrators had not heard. Paris
heard _Falstaff_ at the Opéra Comique in April, 1894, and London at
Covent Garden in the following month. _Falstaff_ was the crowning
effort of a distinguished genius, of a composer who had shed great
lustre on the fame of Italian music, of a man venerable in age and
character and achievement. It was Verdi’s swan-song. He died in Milan
on January 27, 1901.[129]
Verdi’s extended career brings practically every nineteenth-century
Italian composer of note within the category of his chronological
contemporaries; but of contemporaries in the philosophical sense he
had practically none worthy of mention. Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti,
Mercadante, Frederico and Luigi Ricci all outlived the beginning of
Verdi’s artistic career. _I Puritani_ first appeared in 1834, _Don
Pasquale_ in 1843, the _Crispino e la Comare_ of the Ricci brothers in
1850.
Rossini died only three years and Mercadante only one year before
_Aïda_ was produced, though both had long ceased to compose. But all
of these men belong artistically to a period prior to Verdi. Many of
the younger Italians, including Mascagni, Leoncavallo, and Puccini,
had already attracted attention when _Falstaff_ appeared; but they
again belong to a later period. Boïto[130] is hard to classify. He
is the Berlioz of Italian music, on a smaller scale--a polygonal
figure which does not seem to fit into any well-defined niche. His
_Mefistofele_ was produced as early as 1868, yet he seems to belong
musically and dramatically to the post-Wagnerian epoch. Apart from
those who were just beginning or just ending their artistic careers
Italy was almost barren of meritorious composers during most of Verdi’s
life. It would appear as if that one gigantic tree absorbed all the
nourishment from the musical soil of Italy, leaving not enough to give
strength to lesser growths. Of the leading Italian composers chosen to
collaborate on the mass in honor of Rossini, not one, except Frederico
Ricci and Verdi himself, is now remembered.[131] There remains
Amilcare Ponchielli (1834-86) who is important as the founder of the
Italian realistic school which has given to the world _I Pagliacci_,
_Cavalleria Rusticana_, _Le Gioje della Madonna_, and other essays in
blood-letting brutality. His operas include _I Promessi Sposi_ (1856),
_La Savojarda_ (1861), _Roderica_ (1864), _La Stella del Monte_ (1867),
_Le Due Generale_ (1873), _La Gioconda_ (1876), _Il Figliuol Prodigio_
(1880), and _Marion Delorme_ (1885). Of these only _La Gioconda_, which
still enjoys an equivocal popularity, has succeeded in establishing
itself. Ponchielli wrote an amount of other music, sacred and secular,
but none of it calls for special notice, except the _Garibaldi Hymn_
(1882), which is likely to live after all his more pretentious efforts
have been forgotten.
There is nothing more to be said of Verdi’s contemporaries. The history
of his career is practically the history of Italian music during the
same time. He reigned alone in unquestionable supremacy, and, whatever
the future may have in store for Italy, it has not yet disclosed a
worthy successor to his vacant throne.
W. D. D.
FOOTNOTES:
[120] The _Monte di Pietà e d’Abbondanza di Busseto_ is an institution
founded primarily for the relief of the poor and secondarily to help
poor children of promise to develop their talent for the sciences or
fine arts.
[121] This does not sound like extravagant generosity on Merelli’s
part, but it must be remembered that in those days it was customary for
an unknown composer to bear the expense of having his operas produced.
The score of _Oberto_ was purchased by Giovanni Ricordi, founder of the
publishing house of that name, for two thousand Austrian _liri_ (about
three hundred and fifty dollars).
[122] _Nabucco_ is a common Italian abbreviation of Nabucodonosor.
[123] The part of Abigail in _Nabucco_ was taken by Giuseppina
Strepponi, one of the finest lyric _tragédiennes_ of her day, who
afterward became Verdi’s wife.
[124] The _opera d’obbligo_ is the new work which an _impresario_ is
pledged to produce each season by virtue of his agreement with the
municipality as lessee of a theatre.
[125] This ludicrous concession to archiepiscopal scruples recalls
the production of _Nabucco_ in London, where the title was changed
to _Nino, Rè d’Assyria_, in deference to public sentiment--because,
forsooth, Nabucco was a Biblical personage. One can fancy how the
British public of that day would have received Salomé!
[126] _Attila_ in its entirety was never given in Paris.
[127] For the sake of completeness we may mention here as the
chronologically appropriate place Verdi’s _L’Inno delle Nazione_,
written for the London International Exhibition of 1862 as part of
an international musical patch-work in which Auber, Meyerbeer, and
Sterndale Bennett also participated. _L’Inno delle Nazione_ may be
forgotten without damage to Verdi’s reputation.
[128] Contrary to a widespread impression _Aïda_ was not written for
the opening of the Khedival Opera House, that event having taken
place in 1869. It may also be observed that the story of _Aïda_ has
no historical foundation, though it was written with an expert eye to
historical and archæological verisimilitude.
[129] Space does not permit us to speak of Verdi’s personality, his
private life, or the many honors and distinctions which came to him.
The reader is referred to ‘Verdi: Man and Musician,’ by F. J. Crowest,
New York, 1897, and ‘Verdi: An Anecdotic History,’ by Arthur Pougin,
London, 1887.
[130] Arrigo Boïto, b. Padua, 1842, composer and poet, studied at the
Milan Conservatory. See Vol. III.
[131] Besides Verdi and Ricci the list included Buzzola, Bazzini,
Pedrotti, Cagnoni, Nini, Boucheron, Coccia, Jaspari, Platania,
Petrella, and Mabellini. Mercadante was omitted because his age and
feeble health rendered it impossible for him to collaborate in the
work. Jaspari is still in some repute as a musical historiographer.
Transcriber's note:
Obvious punctuation and other printing errors have been corrected.
The book cover has been modified by the Transcriber and is included in
the public domain.