Music by by Arrigo Boito adapted from 's play The Merry Wives of Windsor and from passages from Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2.

First Performance February 9, 1893 at ,

Study Guide and Student Activity Guide for Pacific Victoria’s Production, October, 2013

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SEASON UNDERWRITERS SURTITLES SPONSOR

PUBLIC FUNDING Pacific Opera Victoria 500-1815 Blanshard Street Victoria, BC V8T 5A4 Phone: 250.382.1641 CHORUS DEVELOPMENT ARTIST TRAINING EDUCATION PROGRAMS RAISING VOICES YOUTH PROGRAMS NRS Foundation Box Office: 250.385.0222 DAVID SPENCER Moss Rock Park Koerner MEMORIAL FUND FOUNDATION Foundation www.pov.bc.ca Welcome to Pacific Opera Victoria!

This Guide to has been created for anyone who would like to explore the opera in more detail. The opera experience can be made more meaningful and enjoyable when you have the opportunity to learn about the opera before attending the performance. The guide may also be used to help teachers prepare students for their visit to the opera. It is our hope that teachers will be able to use this material to expand students’ understanding of opera, literature, history, and the fine arts. These materials may be copied and distributed to students. Please visit http://www.pov.bc.ca. to download this guide or to find more information about Falstaff, including musical selections from POV’s Best of YouTube and artist biographies. POV Guides for other are also available for download.

Please Note: The Dress Rehearsal is the last opportunity the singers will have on stage to work with the orchestra before Opening Night. Since vocal demands are so great on opera singers, some singers choose not to sing in full voice during the Dress Rehearsal in order to preserve their voice for opening night.

Contents Welcome to Pacific Opera Victoria! ______1 Cast and Creative Team ______2 Introduction ______3 Synopsis ______4

Verdi’s Last Laugh – The Miracle of Falstaff ______5 The Music of Falstaff ______7 The Composer: Giuseppe Verdi ______9 The Librettist: Arrigo Boito ______14 Meet Falstaff: Robert Holliston interviews Brian Bannatyne-Scott ______15

Resources and Links ______17 Student Activities ______19

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Falstaff A Lyric Comedy in Three Acts Music by Giuseppe Verdi / Libretto by Arrigo Boito adapted from William Shakespeare's play The Merry Wives of Windsor and from passages from Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2.

First Performance February 9, 1893 at La Scala, Milan

Student Dress Rehearsal October 15, 2013, at 7 pm Performances October 17, 19, 23, 25, 2013, at 8 pm. Matinée October 27 at 2:30 pm Royal Theatre, Victoria, BC

In Italian with English surtitles

Cast and Creative Team Cast in order of Vocal Appearance

Dr. Caius, a physician ...... Christopher Mayell Sir , a fat knight ...... Brian Bannatyne-Scott Bardolfo, one of Falstaff’s cronies ...... Josh Lovell Pistola, another of Falstaff’s cronies ...... Jeremy Bowes Meg Page, a neighbour ...... Mia Lennox-Williams Alice Ford, wife of Ford ...... Joni Henson , a neighbour ...... Megan Latham Nannetta, daughter of Alice Ford ...... Rachel Fenlon Fenton, a young gentleman, in love with Nannetta ...... Colin Ainsworth Ford, a wealthy man ...... Brett Polegato

Artistic Director and Conductor...... Timothy Vernon Director ...... Glynis Leyshon Set and Costume Designer ...... Leslie Frankish Lighting Designer...... Kevin Lamotte Chorus Master ...... Giuseppe Pietraroia Stage Manager ...... Sara Robb Assistant Stage Managers ...... Sandy Halliday, Peter Jotkus Principal Coach ...... Robert Holliston The Innkeeper of the Garter; Robin, Falstaff’s page; shopkeepers, townspeople, servants With the Victoria Symphony & the Pacific Opera Victoria Chorus

PRODUCTION PATRON:

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Welcome

Welcome to Pacific Opera Victoria’s 100th production! We're coming full circle: our first production, in 1979, was The Merry Wives of Windsor, Otto Nicolai's adaptation of Shakespeare's play, featuring that incorrigible scoundrel, Sir John Falstaff. We're thrilled to reconnect with Falstaff, this time with Verdi's version, an altogether masterful interpretation that many believe transcends Shakespeare.

How better to mark Verdi's bicentennial than with the old man's glorious parting shot – the greatest comedy in the Italian repertoire. Here is Verdi at the top of his game. About to turn 80, he gave us his last laugh – his first comedy in a half century, written for the sheer joy of it – a rich, layered feast about another old man who faces the indignities of age with irrepressible good humour.

Shakespeare may have invented the character of Sir John Falstaff, but the portly, hard-drinking, womanizing scoundrel is the perfect fit for opera: he lives life large.

Falstaff is a prodigious celebration of laughter and human resilience, with a miraculous score and a dizzying wealth of melody – it is in every way monumental.

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SYNOPSIS

Act One

INISDE THE GARTER INN Sir John Falstaff sits drinking with his servants Bardolfo and Pistolo. In bursts Dr. Caius, accusing the men of robbing him while he was drunk. Falstaff dismisses the accusations and Caius storms out. Unable to pay his large bill at the Inn, Falstaff devises a plan: he will seduce two local matrons in order to gain access to their husbands’ money. When Bardolfo and Pistola claim that honour prevents them from carrying Sir John’s letters to the ladies, Falstaff dispatches a page instead, and throws his henchmen out.

A GARDEN OUTSIDE FORD’S HOUSE Alice Ford and Meg Page amuse themselves comparing identical letters received from Sir John Falstaff. Meanwhile, in another part of the garden, Bardolfo and Pistola inform Alice’s jealous husband of Falstaff’s plot. All devise revenge on Falstaff: aging busybody Mistress Quickly will tell Falstaff that Alice is receptive to his advances, while Falstaff’s own servants will introduce Ford to the old knight under an assumed name. In the midst of this commotion, the Fords’ daughter Nannetta and her lover Fenton steal a few precious moments together.

Act Two

INSIDE THE GARTER INN Mistress Quickly brings a message to Falstaff that Alice will meet him in the afternoon when her husband is always away. She adds that both ladies are pining for him, and that neither knows of the other’s letter. Bardolfo then brings in Ford, introducing him to Falstaff as Mr. Brook, who spins a tale of long-unrequited love for Alice, pleading with the old knight for assistance in winning her affections. Falstaff replies that nothing could be easier – he already has an assignation with her. The jealous Ford struggles to maintain composure.

A ROOM IN FORD’S HOUSE The ladies are preparing for Falstaff’s visit. Nannetta tearfully reveals that her father insists she marry Doctor Caius; Alice reassures her daughter. Falstaff arrives and begins his seduction of Alice, but Meg Page rushes in to warn the pair that Ford is approaching. They hide Falstaff behind a screen. Ford arrives with the other men; they begin searching for Falstaff in a large laundry basket. As they look elsewhere, the ladies bundle Falstaff into the basket. The men pull aside the screen only to discover Nannetta and Fenton in an embrace; Alice orders her servants to tip the basket (with Falstaff inside) into the Thames.

Act Three

OUTSIDE THE GARTER INN Falstaff soothes his injured pride over a glass of wine. Mistress Quickly arrives and assures him that Alice was an innocent in the events at Ford’s house, and that he should appear at “haunted” Windsor Park at midnight, dressed as Herne the Hunter. The others, including Ford (who has been admitted into the conspiracy), plan to dress as goblins, witches, and fairies. Ford secretly promises Caius that he will wed Nannetta that night, but Quickly overhears their scheming.

WINDSOR PARK AT MIDNIGHT Alice instructs Fenton to wear a costume identical to that prescribed by Ford for Caius. They all hide as Falstaff approaches. Alice appears, declaring her love for the old knight, but then runs away. Witches and fairies appear, with Nannetta as the fairy queen. They pinch and poke the terrified Falstaff, demanding that he abandon his dissolute ways. He recognizes Bardolfo, and, realizing he has been successfully tricked, points out that he is still the source of wit in others.

Ford announces the marriage of the Queen of the Fairies, but two similarly attired couples come forward, so a double wedding is performed. Unveiling reveals that Caius has been married to Bardolfo, and Nannetta to Fenton. Ford accepts this with good grace: he who laughs last, laughs best. Robert Holliston

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Verdi's Last Laugh – The Miracle of Falstaff

One of the great lost possibilities of opera is that, after composing two tragedies based on Shakespeare – Macbeth and – Verdi never completed his dreamed-of . But in his 80th year he gave us the unexpected miracle of Falstaff.

The larger-than-life Sir John Falstaff, often called the Homer Simpson of his time, is an aging hellraiser with an undiminished appetite for women, food, booze, and life.

When his bar bill gets out of hand, Sir John decides to fix the problem by seducing two wealthy married women. His approach is anything but subtle: he sends them identical love letters. The women of course see right through him and decide to have some fun. Merry mix-ups, disguises, farce, and romance ensue as the townspeople of Windsor concoct an elaborate hoax to foil Sir John's gold-digging schemes, and our hero ends up in a laundry hamper, a river, and a forest (with a pair of horns on his head).

The ensemble cast includes an assortment of nutbars – a jealous husband / overbearing father, a hot-headed doctor, Falstaff's ne'er-do-well cronies – as well as a pair of star-crossed lovers and a trio of mischievous and formidable women.

Verdi and his librettist, Arrigo Boito, who had written the libretto for Otello, scrounged ingredients from four of Shakespeare's plays to concoct this feast of an opera.

Falstaff appeared in three of Shakespeare's plays – Henry IV, part 1, Henry IV, part 2, and The Merry Wives of Windsor – and his death is reported in Henry V. For their opera, Verdi and Boito took much of the plot of The Merry Wives of Windsor and some of Falstaff's lines from the two Henry IV plays. The opera ends with a happy adaptation from As You Like It: the cynical speech All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players becomes, in the hands of Verdi and Boito, a joyous fugue in praise of laughter: All the world's a joke and man is born a clown ... he laughs best who has the last laugh! One critic called this the funniest, most astonishing and exhilarating fugue ever written for voices.

The problem in Falstaff, if there can be said to be one, is that it has so many tunes. The melodies tumble over one another, one gorgeous phrase after another. Each, in other hands, would be repeated and expanded into a full-fledged aria. Capturing Falstaff's melodies is like trying to catch fireflies.

As POV patron Barbara Wollman observed:

It took me a few listenings (decades ago) to understand Falstaff – the music whizzed by at such a pace that by the time I got my mind around one set of measures I had missed a dozen more ... in contemporary terms, the "tunes" in Falstaff are analogous to a cascade of tweets (twitter messages), as opposed to the formal letter (as an analogy to previous operas).

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The writing of Falstaff proceeded in fits and starts between 1889 and 1892. Despite concerns about his age and health, Verdi found the project irresistible, writing to Boito in July 1889, What joy! To be able to say to the public: We are still here!! Make way for us!!

They worked on the opera in secret, giving it the code name Pancione (Big Belly) and discussing their progress in terms of Pancione's mood and health. Verdi wrote in June 1891: Pancione is on the road that leads to madness. There are days when he doesn't move, sleeps, and is in a bad mood. Other times he shouts, runs, jumps, rages like the devil ... if he persists, I'll put a muzzle and a straitjacket on him.

To which Boito sent an exuberant response: Hurrah! Let him have his way, let him run, he will break all the windows and all the furniture in your room; never mind, you will buy others...let everything be turned topsy-turvy! ...What pandemonium!! But pandemonium as bright as the sun and as dizzying as a house full of lunatics!

In February 1893, that pandemonium was unleashed in a triumphant première at La Scala. Amid the ovations, Verdi insisted that Boito should join him on stage – for Falstaff was the marvellous result of an extraordinary partnership, and the old rogue had finally found his Adolf Hohenstein's costume ideal place – in an opera. design for Falstaff for the 1893 premièe. As poet W.H. Auden said, Even in The Merry Wives of Windsor, Falstaff has not and could not have found his true home because Shakespeare was only a poet. For that he was to wait nearly two hundred years till Verdi wrote his last opera. Falstaff is not the only case of a character whose true home is the world of music; others are Tristan, Isolde and Don Giovanni.

Verdi's last opera – his last laugh – is an absolute joy – monumental and exhilarating.

The renowned opera director, lecturer and writer Thomson Smillie said of the old man's final work: Wagner, Verdi's great contemporary and rival, had ended his career with a profound spiritual statement, Parsifal, whose depths we are still struggling to plumb. Verdi dismisses the human condition as mere folly. No one is qualified to say which is the truer philosophy or the more appropriate statement for a last artistic will and testament, but there is no doubting which is the more endearing.

Maureen Woodall

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The Music of Falstaff

Falstaff is musically perfect. Dominic McHugh, MusicOMHP

[Falstaff is] the most action-packed thing I've ever come across. It never stops ... How Verdi invests the music with such energy, bubbling continuously before breaking into the crazy bits, is real genius ... It's a dream to direct. Canadian director Robert Carsen on Falstaff (Interview with The Guardian)

A miraculous score and a dizzying wealth of melody . . . discover the amazing music and unstoppable drama of Falstaff in these selections from Youtube.

The following musical excerpts are all available at http://www.pov.bc.ca/falstaff-music.html Or you may watch them directly on Youtube (links below).

San Diego OperaTalk! with Nick Reveles http://youtu.be/UI23smTjlnQ San Diego Opera's Nick Reveles hosts this engaging introduction to Falstaff, Verdi's magnificent final opera.

Act 2 Finale http://youtu.be/Em-gphytcYU The old rascal Falstaff tries to seduce the married Alice Ford. She knows exactly what he's up to, but leads him on as part of the plot to teach him a lesson. He recalls his glory days with the delicious aria Quando ero paggio del duca di Norfolk When I was a page to the Duke of Norfolk, I was slim, slim, slim. I was handsome, graceful, and thin. Those were the days of my flowering Spring They are interrupted with the news that Alice's husband is on his way. Ford roars in and turns the place upside down in a search for Alice's lover. Falstaff hides behind a screen and then stuffs himself inside a laundry hamper. Meanwhile, Ford's daughter Nannetta and her lover Fenton slip behind the screen for a little smooching. They are discovered by Ford, who orders Fenton to leave. In the ensuing uproar, the hamper with Falstaff inside is dumped out the window and into the river. With Paul Plishka as Falstaff, Mirella Freni as Alice, Bruno Pola as Ford, Marilyn Horne as Mistress Quickly, Barbara Bonney as Nannetta, Frank Lopardo as Fenton, and Susan Graham as Meg. From a 1992 Metropolitan Opera production, conducted by James Levine.

"Quand'ero Paggio" sung by the original Falstaff http://youtu.be/gX-e73R2Kvk Here is a 1907 recording of French Victor Maurel, who created the role of Falstaff, singing When I was a page to the Duke of Norfolk. He sings this very short aria first in Italian, then, after some applause, repeats it in Italian and finally in French. Maurel was also the first Iago, in Verdi's Otello.

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Act 3: Nannetta's Aria, "Sul fil d'un soffio etesio" http://youtu.be/pCY3Hj9FE0M Falstaff has been lured to the "haunted" Windsor Park at midnight for a rendezvous with Alice Ford. He is to dress as Herne the Hunter, a ghost that wears antlers on his head and haunts Windsor Forest. It's all all part of an elaborate hoax in which the townsfolk of Windsor plan to disguise themselves as goblins, witches, and fairies and haunt Windsor Forest to teach the old rogue a lesson. Nannetta, dressed as the Queen of the Fairies, sings this lovely aria. On the breath of a fragrant breeze fly nimble spirits; through the branches appears the blue gleam of the rising moon. Dance! And let your soft steps fit the soft music, joining magic dancing to the song Shakespeare described Herne the Hunter in The Merry Wives of Windsor: Sometime a keeper here in Windsor Forest, Doth all the winter-time, at still midnight, Walk round about an oak, with great ragg'd horns; And there he blasts the tree, and takes the cattle, And makes milch-kine yield blood, and shakes a chain In a most hideous and dreadful manner. You have heard of such a spirit, and well you know The superstitious idle-headed eld Receiv'd, and did deliver to our age, This tale of Herne the Hunter for a truth. From a 1981 La Scala telecast conducted by Lorin Maazel. With Juan Pons as Falstaff and Patricia Wise as Nannetta

Final fugue: Tutto nel mondo è burla http://youtu.be/7E4S-E2qAX8 Verdi ended Falstaff with, of all things, a fugue! Falstaff starts it off, and in turn, all the characters join in. Tutto nel mondo è burla. L'uom è nato burlone, nel suo cervello ciurla sempre la sua ragione. Tutti gabbati! Irride l'un l'altro ogni mortal, ma ride ben chi ride la risata final.

Everything in the world is a joke, and man is born a clown. Within his addled head his brains are in a churn. We all are fools! And every man laughs at the others' folly. But he laughs best who has the last laugh. F. Paul Driscoll, Editor in Chief of Opera News, calls Falstaff's final fugue the most joyous piece of music that Verdi ever wrote. With Gabriel Bacquier as Falstaff, Karan Armstrong as Alice Ford, Richard Stilwell as Ford, Max-René Cosotti as Fenton, John Lanigan as Doctor Caius, Ulrik Cold as Pistola, Peter Maus as Bardolfo, Jutta-Renate Ihloff as Nannetta, Sylvia Lindenstrand as Meg Page, Marta Szirmay as Mistress Quickly, Leopold Clam as the innkeeper, and Stefan Hanke as Robin. From a 1979 film directed by Götz Friedrich, with Sir Georg Solti conducting the Vienna Philharmonic.

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The Composer: Giuseppe Verdi 1813 was a fine year for opera lovers as two giants of the operatic world were born: the German and the Italian Giuseppe Verdi. Giuseppe Verdi dominated Italian opera for half a century with 28 operas that include some of the best known in the repertoire, among them Nabucco, Macbeth, , , , A Masked Ball (), Don Carlos, Aïda, Otello, and Falstaff. Verdi was not only a very popular and successful composer, but an astute businessman and producer, an active and committed farmer, a hero of the Italian nationalist movement, a member of the first Italian Parliament, and a generous philanthropist. Verdi’s operas remain as popular today as when they first appeared and form the core of today’s standard repertoire. Many of the tunes from his operas are familiar even to people who know nothing of opera.

Youth Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was born in October 1813 in the small village of Roncole, about 65 miles southeast of Milan in the province of in . At the time, Italy was made up of several small states, most ruled by foreign powers. Parma was occupied by Napoleon's army, and Verdi's original birth certificate is French, with his name registered as Joseph Fortunin François. The area around Roncole was farming country. Verdi’s parents ran a tavern and a grocery store and leased land and houses which they sublet to tenant farmers. Young Verdi showed an early interest in music and was encouraged by his father, who bought an old spinet piano and sent him to the church organist for lessons. Soon Giuseppe was substituting as organist at the town church. He was also an altar boy. Once when he was about seven, his attention wandered during Mass, and the priest knocked him down. The child responded by cursing the priest, “May God strike you with lightning.” Eight years later, the priest was killed when lightning struck a nearby church, killing four priests, two laymen, and two dogs. Verdi delighted in retelling this story. Perhaps it shaped his fascination with the power of Monterone’s curse in Rigoletto, an opera that Verdi originally titled La Maledizione (The Curse). When Verdi was ten, his father sent him to the nearby city of Busseto for further musical training. He stayed in the home of Antonio Barezzi, a local merchant and music enthusiast and gave singing and piano lessons to Barezzi's daughter Margherita, whom he would later marry. He also studied composition with Ferdinando Provesi, the local organist, choirmaster, teacher at the music school, and leader of the amateur Philharmonic Society orchestra. Verdi became Provesi's protégé and assistant, playing organ, composing, arranging and copying music and conducting rehearsals. At the age of 18, with financial support from Barezzi, Verdi went to Milan to apply to the Conservatory. Although Milan is now part of Italy, at the time, it was under Austrian occupation, and a passport was needed for travel between Busseto and Milan. Although he was rejected by the Conservatory, Verdi stayed in Milan to study counterpoint with Vincenzo Lavigna, an opera composer who had played for many years at La Scala, Milan’s renowned opera house. In 1836, having returned to Busseto, Verdi married Margherita Barezzi, accepted the position of maestro of the Busetto Philharmonic, and composed his first opera, Rocester, which he later renamed Oberto, conte di San Bonifacio.

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The Verdis’ daughter Virginia was born in 1837, but died the following year. In 1839 Giuseppe and Margherita moved back to Milan with their little son, Icilio Romano, who died shortly after. Verdi had tried without success to have Oberto performed in either Parma or Milan, but in 1839, thanks to the recommendation of the soprano , Bartolomeo Merelli, the impresario at La Scala, finally agreed to present Oberto. The opera was successful enough to persuade Merelli to offer Verdi a contract to write more operas. While Verdi was working on his next opera, a comedy called Un Giorno di Regno, his wife died. The deaths of his entire young family within such a short time left him devastated. Although he completed Un Giorno di Regno, it was a failure, and Verdi resolved never to compose again. Giuseppe Verdi Early operas It took two years for Merelli to persuade Verdi to compose another opera. The biblical story of the Israelites’ captivity in Babylon eventually captured Verdi’s imagination, and in 1842 Nabucco made its triumphant premiere with Giuseppina Strepponi in the lead role of Abigaille. Verdi became a celebrity overnight, not least because the Italian audience identified with the Israelites, another people who were subjugated by foreign powers. The opera’s Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves, “Va pensiero” was sung in the streets of Milan and became an unofficial Italian national anthem. Verdi was suddenly an inspirational figure in the Risorgimento, the movement toward a free, united Italy. He was also now in demand as an opera composer and began what he called his “years as a galley slave,” cranking out opera after opera, feeding the insatiable operatic appetites of theatres and audiences throughout Italy and in Paris and . Between 1843 and 1850 he composed and often directed productions of 13 new operas, including Ernani, Macbeth, and Luisa Miller. By 1850, Verdi was the leading composer of opera in Italy and one of the most successful in all of Europe. His works, tuneful, highly dramatic, often with political overtones, captivated audiences. They also brought prosperity to Verdi, to his Italian publisher Giovanni Ricordi, (and to succeeding generations of the Ricordi family, including son Tito and grandson Giulio) and to numerous impresarios and agents. During this time Verdi had kept in touch with Giuseppina Strepponi, the soprano who had recommended Verdi’s first opera and starred in his second. By 1846, ill health had forced Strepponi to retire from singing. She and Verdi began working closely together in Paris in 1847, and Strepponi, with her inside knowledge of the theatrical and musical world, became Verdi’s devoted and able collaborator. Over the next 50 years, until her death in 1897, she helped him in business and musical matters and handled negotiations and disputes with agents, impresarios, censors, and colleagues. She also became his mistress. This relationship caused a scandal among Verdi’s family and friends, who were appalled by her reputation – she had several illegitimate children – and by the fact that she and Verdi lived openly together for several years before finally marrying in 1859.

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The high point of Verdi’s “galley years” came with his “big three” – “RigTrovTrav”, the three operas that are his most popular. Rigoletto premiered in 1851 in ; Il trovatore was launched in Rome in 1853, followed six weeks later by La traviata in Venice. While both Rigoletto and Il trovatore were immediate hits, La traviata was at first less of a success. Verdi called the premiere of La traviata a fiasco; it wasn’t actually an abject failure – it did well enough at the box office, and Verdi had to take several bows during Act 1. But he was disappointed that censors had insisted on unceremoniously forcing his cutting-edge contemporary work to time-travel a century and a half into the past. He was also none too pleased with the singers. The soprano, Fanny Salvini- Donatelli, sang well, but was plump enough to elicit laughter as she portrayed a frail consumptive in Act 3. The , Lodovico Graziani, went hoarse in the second act, and the baritone, , put little heart into his performance, grumpily complaining about both the subject matter (the main character is a kept woman or rather a common whore) and the smallness of his own role (as the first Rigoletto and the first Macbeth, he felt that Germont was a step down).

Dealing with Censorship Despite Verdi’s popularity and the rapidity with which he churned out hit after hit, writing and producing the operas was anything but a smooth process. In particular, Verdi had constant battles with censors. Each opera was commissioned for a particular opera house, and each libretto had to be approved by the appropriate authorities, who, given Italy’s fractured state, varied from city to city, and could include church authorities as well as Austrian and French officials. Opera was a popular and prominent entertainment, and censors were at pains to make sure that operas were morally and politically inoffensive. What would satisfy the censors in one jurisdiction would not pass in another. Both Rigoletto and La traviata premiered at the Teatro , which was in Austrian-controlled Venice. ( ruled much of northern Italy during the mid-19th century). A libretto in Venice required approval from the theatre management, the mayor of the city, and the Austrian Department of Public Order. The opening of Rigoletto had to be delayed while Verdi and his librettist, Francesco Maria Piave, battled with the Venetian censors. The play on which Rigoletto had been based, Le roi s'amuse (The King Amuses Himself) by Victor Hugo, had opened in Paris two decades previously, in 1832, played for one night, and been promptly banned as obscene and politically subversive. The play was based on the life of the French King Francis I, who had been safely dead since 1547. However, Hugo’s King Francis was a little too much like the current King, Louis-Phillipe, who had survived an assassination attempt just before the play opened. The censors were not amused and shut the play down. Despite a lawsuit by the furious playwright, the ban on performances remained in place for fifty years, even though the printed version of the play was available. It was not until November 22, 1882, that Le roi s’amuse could finally be seen again in Paris – a quarter century after Verdi’s Rigoletto first played Paris. Rigoletto was finally staged once Verdi and his librettist Francesco Maria Piave moved the action from France to Mantua and changed the title from to La Maledizione (The Curse) to Rigoletto (these changes were much more minor than some that had been proposed, including getting rid of Rigoletto’s hump and the sack in which Gilda’s body was placed). La traviata too had to be altered to please the censors. Fresh from the epic battle with the Venetian censors over Rigoletto, Verdi and Piave could not have been surprised that their sympathetic portrayal of a prostitute would again raise hackles. Verdi managed to get La traviata approved, but only after the setting was moved back 150 years to the Paris of Louis XIV, thus avoiding the uncomfortable realities of

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Verdi’s contemporary setting. The censors wanted it safely dated in the past. They also insisted that Verdi change his title from Amore e Morte – Love and Death – to the more judgemental La traviata, meaning The Woman Who Strayed or The Fallen Woman. In the case of Verdi’s 1859 opera Un ballo in maschera (A Masked Ball), no compromise could be reached with the censors in Naples. The opera’s plot was based on the 1789 assassination of the Swedish King Gustavus III in Stockholm. In the face of the censors’ adamant refusal to allow the assassination of a king to be shown on stage, Verdi withdrew the opera and offered it to Rome. The papal censor was satisfied once Verdi had changed the setting to 17th-century Boston and transformed the King of Sweden into the Count of Warwick.

Italian Politics Given the times and Italy’s political situation, the inflexibility of the Austrian censors in Naples was understandable. There had been an attempt on the life of Napoleon III in Paris in 1858, and an opera on the assassination of a ruler might give the populace ideas. Revolt was in the air. The Risorgimento, the movement to unite Italy, was in full swing, and war between the nationalists and Austria was imminent. Verdi himself was a popular figure among the nationalists. Not only did his operas appeal to patriots, but his very name was an acronym for the revolution. The slogan “Viva VERDI” became code for “Vittorio Emanuele, Re D’Italia” (Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy). Victor Emmanuel was the king of Piedmont and a prime candidate to be leader of a united Italy. Piedmont, which had remained independent of Austria during the 19th century, allied with France and went to war against Austria in 1859, conquering some, but not all the provinces of Italy. Over the next decade, in a series of campaigns, bits and pieces were added on to Italy, but as early as 1861, unification was sufficiently underway that the first Italian parliament was established. Verdi himself was elected to this parliament, and Victor Emmanuel was proclaimed King of Italy. In 1866, when Italian government forces allied with Prussia against Austria to conquer the last remaining territories under Austrian control, Verdi contributed money and guns for the troops. In 1874, King Victor Emmanuel decreed him a lifetime Senator. Truth be told, Verdi was not a particularly active statesman. He showed up at the Senate to take his oath and worked on getting government subsidies for the theatre.

The Later Operas During these intensely political times, Verdi was also intensely creative; between 1851 and 1871 he wrote some of his greatest operas, beginning with the “RigTrovTrav” big three, along with (1857), Un ballo in maschera ( 1859), ( 1862), and Don Carlos (1867), and culminating with the spectacular Aïda (1871), the grandest of grand operas, notorious for being the Opera With Elephants. As part of the celebrations surrounding the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, the Khedive (a Turkish Viceroy who ruled Egypt) Ismail Pasha built a new opera house in . The inaugural performance in the opera house was Verdi's Rigoletto. The Khedive also commissioned Verdi to write an opera with an Egyptian theme specifically for the new Cairo Opera House. This was to be Aïda, which premiered spectacularly in 1871 and has dazzled the world ever since. At the premiere, there were 300 people on stage, and the audience of dignitaries and Egyptophiles included the khedive and his harem. The conductor was , also a composer and a double virtuoso. In his enthusiasm for the opera, Bottesini went beyond the call of duty and financed a menagerie of animals for the Triumphal March in the second act, including 12 elephants, 15 camels, and assorted zebras, giraffes, lions, ostriches, jackals, baboons, and rodents. Only the elephants

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and camels were trained well enough to perform; the other animals died of neglect, apparently because Bottesini forgot about them. After the success of Aïda, Verdi decided to retire from writing operas. He was already well off, and his fee and royalties for Aïda made him quite wealthy. At the age of 58, he was happy to devote himself to his farm in Sant'Agata while occasionally composing or revising and producing some of his earlier works. Verdi had bought the farm at Sant’Agata in 1848 and moved there with Strepponi in 1851. Over the years it had been a sanctuary and a workplace, not only for composing, but for farming. He remodeled the house and expanded the farm, participating actively in the farm work along with his tenant farmers. Although Verdi is best known as an opera composer, he did write other music, most notably the monumental of 1874. After the death of the eminent opera composer Gioacchino Rossini in 1868, Verdi had proposed that Italian composers each contribute a section to a Requiem Mass in Rossini’s honour. This was done, but the complete mass was not performed during Verdi’s lifetime. Several years later, in 1873, Alessandro Manzoni, an Italian novelist and poet, died, and Verdi decided to use his “Libera me” as the starting point for a Requiem Mass honouring Manzoni. Verdi’s complete Requiem was performed at the cathedral in Milan, on the first anniversary of Manzoni’s death. Some critics charged that the Requiem was too operatic and not sacred enough. The German conductor and composer Hans von Bülow called it “Verdi's latest opera, though in ecclesiastical robes.” But composer Johannes Brahms called it a work of genius. Certainly it is a stunningly dramatic, profoundly emotional work; in particular the section called Dies Irae (Day of Wrath) captures the horror and terror of Judgement Day. Verdi’s Final Years Sixteen years after his “retirement”, the 74-year-old Verdi premiered his next opera, Otello, based on Shakespeare’s play. Verdi had a profound admiration for Shakespeare, and his publisher and composer-poet Arrigo Boito, with Giuseppina Strepponi’s support, were able to persuade Verdi to take on this project. It was followed by another opera inspired by Shakespeare, the comedy Falstaff, which had its triumphant première at La Scala in 1893, when Verdi was approaching 80. Falstaff was the first comic opera Verdi had written since Un giorno di regno, more than 50 years earlier. At the end of his career, the master of tragic opera created in Falstaff what has been called the greatest comic opera in the Italian repertoire. Verdi also worked during his so-called retirement on philanthropic projects, founding a hospital and establishing the Casa di Riposo, a home for retired musicians in Milan. Verdi purchased land for the Casa di Riposo in 1889 and began construction of the house in 1896. He saw the Casa di Riposo as a way to provide for musicians less fortunate than himself. In his will, Verdi left the building and grounds and all the royalties from his compositions to the Casa di Riposo, which still exists, serving as a home for singers, dancers, and other musicians, as well as visiting music students. Giuseppina died in 1897. Verdi then lived at the Grand Hotel in Milan, finding companionship with retired soprano Teresa Stolz, whom he had known for some 30 years. Rumours were that they had long been lovers; Stolz had also performed much of Verdi’s music and sang Aïda in the 1872 Milan premiere. Verdi suffered a stroke on January 21, 1901 and died six days later. He was buried in Milan at the Casa di Riposo. His funeral was a national event, and thousands lined the streets, singing "Va, pensiero," the famous chorus from Nabucco. Among the mourners were such great composers as Rossini, Donizetti, and Puccini.

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The Librettist: Arrigo Boito When the greatest composer-librettist teams in opera are mentioned, three partnerships are usually the first to come to mind: Wolfgang Mozart and Lorenzo Da Ponte; Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal; and Giuseppe Verdi and Arrigo Boito.

Verdi and Boito completed only two operas together – Otello and Falstaff, the last two operas of Verdi’s career. Yet those two operas were enough to vault their collaboration to the top tier of composer-librettist collaborations.

Born in 1842, Boito was nearly 30 years Verdi’s junior. Although he was a composer, with one finished opera, , to his credit, Boito is best known today as a poet and as a librettist, most notably for ’s and for the two Verdi masterpieces.

Verdi and Boito first worked together in 1862 when Boito wrote the text of Verdi’s cantata (Hymn of the Nations). Shortly after, however, Boito managed to offend Verdi, to the point where the two were estranged for many years. Boito was among a group of young intellectuals called Scapigliati (roughly “slobs” or “dishevelled ones,” the Italian equivalent to the French bohème) who saw German art and Wagner as the wave of the future and thought Italian opera was backward and old- fashioned. In 1863, Boito wrote an ode after the première of an opera by , one of the Scapigliati. In it he hailed Faccio as the composer fated “to cleanse the altar of Italian opera of the stains that now defile it like a brothel wall.” Not surprisingly, Verdi, the chief face of Italian opera, took offence.

Boito and Verdi were eventually reconciled and in 1881, perhaps as a trial run for a full-fledged collaboration, Verdi’s publisher Ricordi persuaded Verdi to allow Boito to revise the libretto of Simon Boccanegra. Verdi was won over, and the two went on to develop a close partnership and a friendship which lasted until Verdi’s death.

Knowing they shared a deep admiration for Shakespeare, Boito initiated the process of composition for each of the twin miracles of Verdi's old age, Otello and Falstaff. It was his brilliance in reducing, adapting and reforming the characters and situations of the Shakespearean plays that convinced Verdi that he could return to the compositional table. It was his encouragement that persuaded the old man to undertake the greatest artistic risk of his life, to write a comedy, almost devoid of arias, in a style that defied all traditional expectations of Italian opera. Verdi was at last able to write for himself. The results were exhilarating. (Iain Scott, Arias Magazine, 2003)

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Meet Falstaff Robert Holliston interviews Brian Bannatyne-Scott You have performed a wide range of roles and repertoire – from Purcell to newly composed works and everything in between. Did you set out to achieve this diversity or has it simply been a matter of accepting what was offered? The wide range of roles largely came about due to circumstance. I enjoyed early music and sang a fair bit at University, and at the start of my career I sang as a member of the Scottish Early Music Consort, covering Medieval to Baroque, while also singing opera from Cavalli to Castiglione. In the late 80s, I began to sing a lot of Russian music, but the fall of Communism brought hundreds of excellent Russian singers to the West, blocking that route. I signed up in 1989 with an agency in London which specialized in early music, so while singing mainstream opera with ENO, I also became known as a Baroque singer, working particularly closely with Trevor Pinnock and Marc Minkowski, who preferred their basses to have full-throated voices, rather than the, at the time, trendy light baritone. It helped that, even with my big voice, I could sing fast coloratura. More recently, I have been singing more high Romantic music like Strauss, Wagner, Debussy and Verdi – that is largely due to my voice maturing into these roles. Not having perfect pitch, and not being much of a fan of avant-garde music, I have tended to avoid new compositions, but have taken on the occasional role as a sort of challenge, like the Father in Thanks to my Eyes by Bianchi, and I will sing my first John Adams role, Frank Hubbard in Doctor Atomic, next year in Strasbourg. The UK has always been known and admired for its rich choral tradition. Did you sing a lot in church as a boy, or in a school choir? The question of UK choral tradition is a microcosm of the present Independence debate in Scotland. The tradition of church and cathedral choirs in England is long and well-known but had no real impact on me as a Scot. Church choirs in Scotland tend to be of the elderly wobbling variety (I exaggerate obviously) and played no part in my musical education. I did go to a very musical school in Edinburgh, and was encouraged from early on to sing in the choir. However, as my voice changed and as cricket became more important to me, choral singing became less interesting, and it was only at St Andrew’s University that I learned to sing Renaissance polyphony while developing my voice as a soloist. Very many of my English colleagues however have emerged through the English choral tradition. I was very interested to see that you majored at University in French and Medieval history. Did you decide as a young adult to switch to music as a profession? Also, do you still have an active interest in history? My studies at university were always geared toward my academic interests rather than toward a profession. By 17 or 18, I knew I wanted to be a singer, provided I was good enough. My parents and school teachers advised me to delay thinking about music college until I had reached my 20s, so I decided to go to university to broaden my knowledge. The Scottish education system has always encouraged diversity. All this time, I continued to have singing lessons in Glasgow, and when I was 23, I studied singing full time at the Guildhall School of Music in London. This allowed me to emerge straight from Guildhall into the profession, where I won the Decca Kathleen Ferrier Prize, appeared in televised masterclasses with Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, made my debut at La Fenice in Venice, and joined Scottish Opera as a principal singer.

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However, my degree in French and History has meant that I work a lot in Francophone countries and enjoy exploring historical sights wherever I travel, rather than shopping and watching TV! Would you care to discuss your thoughts about Falstaff? Is there anything particularly rewarding and/or challenging about Verdi's writing for your voice type? Falstaff is one of the most rewarding roles anyone can wish for, and I am delighted I can share my interpretation with the good folks of Victoria. I first heard the opera in my teens and remember being fascinated by the piece and listening to lots of recordings. I suppose because I became a bit of a German Romantic at that time (obsessed with Wagner, Bruckner and Mahler), it was natural that, of Verdi's output, the later operas attracted me more, since, although not really influenced by Wagner, they tended toward a more through-composed style. I loved Don Carlo (it also has two great bass roles), and Otello was and still is one of my very favourite works. What I loved about Falstaff was its zest and bubbling enthusiasm, and that an old man could produce such an optimistic piece. I sang Pistola (the bass role in Falstaff) several times in England, France, and Switzerland in enjoyable productions with some superb singers and conductors (including Vancouver's Jonathan Darlington), but never really considered the title role, as it is a baritone. It was only after singing Ochs (Rosenkavalier) and La Roche (Capriccio) in Bielefeld (Germany) that the music director asked if I'd like to sing Falstaff himself. People had always suggested that my liking for good food and wine made me a natural for the role (Hoho), but after some thought and a sing through, I decided I would give it a go. The result surprised me, and I found that, although it is higher than my other roles, it sits reasonably well in my voice. I have always been a bright high bass, so it wasn't such a huge leap. It also helps that the other baritone role in Falstaff, Ford, is a real Verdi baritone, so a contrast between the two voices is useful and makes for a better relationship between the two characters. So the challenge of the role is that it is high, and the reward is to be able to sing it!! In closing … I am looking forward enormously to my return to Canada and Victoria. The added pleasure is that my wife (whom I met nearly 40 years ago at St Andrews University) will be coming to Victoria on October 15th for her first visit to Canada.

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Resources and Links

These links are also available at www.pov.bc.ca/falstaff.html, along with detailed bios of the cast and creative team for Falstaff and information on the Shakespeare Onstage-Offstage Celebration of Shakespeare, which takes place in September and October 2013.

Falstaff: The Opera

• http://imslp.org/wiki/Falstaff_%28Verdi,_Giuseppe%29 Scores of the Opera, including full orchestral score, vocal score, and an arrangement for piano solo, published by Ricordi

• http://archive.org/details/falstaffalyrica02shakgoog Libretto of the Opera, in Italian and English

• http://books.google.ca/books?id=GmKbbB79GwoC&pg=PA218&lpg=PA218&dq=verdi+boito+qu otes+on+falstaff&source=bl&ots=GusmhAHxed&sig=JpG9vdNBPDCzwnp7agTtSsKbKdc&hl=en&s a=X&ei=kCU- UvGlMM_iigLP5YCABw&ved=0CEYQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=verdi%20boito%20quotes%20on% 20falstaff&f=false The Verdi-Boito Correspondence: The fascinating letters between Verdi and his librettist Arrigo Boito include much discussion, with joy and verve, of Falstaff. A Google Books preview with limited pages available. Edited by Marcello Conati and Mario Medici.

• http://books.google.ca/books?id=DMsSSGQj32MC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false Giuseppe Verdi: Falstaff: Extracts from a Cambridge Opera Handbook on Falstaff, edited by James A. Hepokoski. A Google Books preview with limited pages available.

• http://dropera.blogspot.ca/ Operation Opera: A blog by Dr. Glenn Winters of Virginia Opera. Glenn tells us why Falstaff is not only his favourite opera, but his favourite work of music (yes, even more so than Marvin Gaye's classic "Heard it on the Grapevine") – and in fact his favourite work of art! He tells us why he has a crush on Alice Ford, even though she lacks arias, a death scene, a mad scene, and a passionate love duet. He also tells us why Verdi is the composer he'd most like to have lunch with.

Shakespeare's Falstaff

• http://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Foyer/plays/1H4.html Henry IV, Part 1: Information about the play, plus quarto, folio, and modern editions of the text, including facsimiles, performance information, artifacts, and much more from Internet Shakespeare Editions. For Falstaff's famous speech on honour, see Act V, Scene I: How then? Can honour set to a leg? No. Or an arm? No. Or take away the grief of a wound? No. Honour hath no skill in surgery, then? No. What is honour? A word. What is in that word "honour"? What is that "honour"? Air. A trim reckoning! Who hath it? He that died a'Wednesday. Doth he feel it? No. Doth he hear it? No. 'Tis insensible then? Yea, to the dead. But will it not live with the living? No. Why? Detraction will not suffer it. Therefore I'll none of it. Honour is a mere scutcheon. And so ends my catechism.

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Boito's version is surprisingly similar: What a joke! Can honour fill your belly? No. Can honour set a broken shin? It cannot. Or mend a foot? No. Or a finger? No. Or a hair? No. Honour is not a surgeon. What is it, then? A word. What's in this word? Air, which flies away. A fine concept! Does a dead man know honour? No. Does it live, then, only with the living? Not even, for it puffs up at flattery, pride corrupts it, slander softens it. For me, I'll have no part of it!

• http://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Foyer/plays/2H4.html Henry IV, Part 2: Information about the play, plus quarto and folio editions of the text, including facsimiles, performance information and artifacts from Internet Shakespeare Editions. Act I, Scene II, has another of Falstaff's most memorable lines: Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me: the brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not able to invent anything that tends to laughter, more than I invent or is invented on me: I am not only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other men. Boito again quotes almost directly from Shakespeare: All kinds of common folk jeer at me now, and are proud of it. But without me, their arrogance would be flat and flavourless. It is I who season it for you. I am not only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other men.

• http://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Foyer/plays/Wiv.html The Merry Wives of Windsor: Information about the play, plus quarto and folio editions of the text, including facsimiles, performance information and artifacts from Internet Shakespeare Editions. Much of the plot of the opera comes from this play.

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Student Activities Exploring Plot and Character Create a character sketch for one of the characters (for example, Falstaff, Ford, Nannetta). Questions you might ask about the character include: What are we told about this character? (read the libretto for clues) What else do we know about this character? (For example, you might see what Shakespeare says about the character) What is the character’s relationship with the other characters? Why does the character make the choices he or she does? Include evidence from the opera to support your claim. Keep in mind the music sung by your character. Do the emotions conveyed through the music fit the character sketches? Create a journal or a Facebook page for your character. Write about the events of the opera from that character’s point of view. Write in the first person, and include only information that the character would know.

After the Opera Draw a picture of your favourite scene in the opera. What is happening in this scene? What characters are depicted?

Create an opera design. Design and draw a stage set for a scene in Falstaff. Design and draw costumes for the characters in the scene.

Write a review of the opera. What did you think about the sets, props and costumes? Would you have done something differently? Why? What were you expecting? Did it live up to your expectations? Talk about the singers. Describe their characters. Describe their voices. Who was your favourite character? What was your favourite visual moment in the opera? What was your favourite musical moment in the opera?

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