La traviata or The Fallen One—An Introduction
Certain names are synonymous with opera, and Giuseppe Verdi’s is one of them. His operas are a major part of the international repertory; that is to say that they are among the most performed on the opera stages of the world. Verdi, as one might expect, is especially popular in his native Italy. In fact, it’s safe to say that, although few Italians know the words to “Fratelli d’Italia,” their national anthem, most are able to join in an impromptu chorus of “Va pensiero” from Nabucco. As much as any composer can be, Verdi has been elevated to the status of national hero.
Giuseppe Verdi was born in 1813 and died in 1901, thus his life spanned almost an entire century. Politically, he saw Europe at the highpoint of the nineteenth-century revolutions. Musically, he entered the operatic world at a time when the compositional traditions of the primo Ottocento — the Italian term for the early 1800s — had begun to change. Driven by his personal quest to balance music and drama, he pioneered new ways to set librettos. Yet Verdi did not abandon the forms found in opera scores from before the time of Rossini. Nevertheless, he was bold enough to manipulate them when the dramatic integrity of the work called for innovation. One perfect example occurs in La traviata. At the end of Act 2, Alfredo gravely insults Violetta in front of others; no matter what she may be or what she may have done, no gentleman would ever publicly insult a woman. Each character reacts to this affront in a powerful largo or slow movement: his father reprimanding him, Alfredo can only reply in broken sentences. Meanwhile, Violetta begs for his understanding — all backed by other characters and the chorus. In every early nineteenth-century Italian opera, the largo would be followed by a rapid-paced stretta in which everyone would sing at breakneck speed. Verdi knew that after Alfredo’s insult and the characters’ responses, a stretta would compromise the dramatic effect of this moment. And so, he simply ended the act without one! It meant nothing to Verdi that audiences might expect a stretta — he knew that it did not belong.
It’s easy to remember the length of Verdi’s compositional career: his first opera, Oberto, premiered in 1839. Just reverse the last two numbers in that date and you have the year of his final opera, Falstaff: 1893.
