| Did You Know | |
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Giuseppe Verdi’s Nabucco was almost a "never-was". The comic opera he was under contract to compose, Un Giorno di Regno, did not please - to say the least - due to the composer’s mindset following the tragic deaths of his daughter, son and young wife within a three-year period. After the failure of Un Giorno di Regno, Verdi asked for a release from his contract and vowed never to compose again. Later, Verdi was asked by a friend to read the manuscript for Nabucco which he accepted with a certain amount of uneasiness. In his autobiography, Verdi says, “I threw the manuscript with a violent gesture on the table and stood rigid before it. The libretto falling on the table, opened itself and without my quite realizing it my eyes fixed on the page before me at one particular line: ‘Va, pensiero, sull’ ali dorate’ (Go, thought, on golden wings).” As you can probably guess, Verdi fell in love with the manuscript and, little by little, was able to overcome his domestic disaster and create one of the world’s greatest operas. At his funeral, fifty-eight years later, a crowd of thousands sang the great chorus, “Va, pensiero,” that almost never was. | |
