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Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901)La Traviata (Highlights)Opera in 3 ActsLibretto: Francesco Maria PiaveVioletta Valery - Monika Krause, soprano Flora Bervoix - Rannveig Braga, mezzo-soprano Annina - Ivica Neshybova, soprano Alfredo Germont - Yordy Ramiro, tenor Giorgio Germont, his father - Georg Tichy, baritone Dottore Grenvil - Jozef Spacek, baritoneSlovak Philharmonic ChorusSlovak Radio Symphony OrchestraAlexander Rahbari, conductor GiuseppeVerdi's career spans three quarters of the nineteenth century. He was born in1813 at Le Roncole, near Busseto, the son of a tavern-keeper, and distinguishedhimself locally in music. The encouragement and patronage of his futurefather-in-law, Antonio Barezzi, a merchant in Busseto, allowed him furtherstudy in Milan, before returning to Busseto as maestro di musica. Hisfirst venture into opera, a reasonably successful one, was in 1839 with Oberto.This was followed, however, by the failure of Un giomo di regno, writtenat a period when the composer suffered the death of his wife and two children.His early reputation was established by the opera Nabucco, staged at LaScala in Milan in 1842.Verdi'ssubsequent career in Italy was to bring him unrivalled fame, augmented by hisreputation as a patriot and fervent supporter of Italian national unity. Hisname itself was treated as an acronym for the proposed monarch of a united Italy, 'Vittorlo Emanuele re d'Italia,' and much of his work in the period of unificationwas susceptible to patriotic interpretation. His long association with thesinger Giuseppina Strepponi led to their marriage in 1859, the year of Un balloin maschera. He completed his last opera, FaIstaff in 1893, fouryears before her death, but felt himself unequal to further Shakespearianoperas that were then proposed. He died while staying in Milan, early in 1901,his death the subject of national mourning throughout Italy.LaTraviata, firstproduced in Venice in 1853, is based on a very different source, the play Ladame aux camelias by Alexandre Dumas fils. The French play, originally, in1848, a novel, and dramatised in 1852, was the first significant success in thetheatre of Alexandre Dumas, the illegitimate son of the author of Le Comtede Monte Cristo and Les trois mousquetaires. The piece was anearly example of theatrical realism, a movement with its parallel in the visualarts and other branches of literature. This is seen in particular in thedramatist's preoccupation with the contemporary position of the fallen woman, amatter that was of continuing if occasionally saccharine interest to Frenchwriters and composers for the rest of the century. The courtesan MargueriteGautier, the woman of the title, is in love with young Armand Duval, whosefather persuades her unselfishly to renounce him. Marguerite and Armand areonly reconciled when all is revealed, as the former lies dying. The story hadobvious appeal to Verdi, who was familiar with life in Paris. At the same timeit had at least hints of his own long-stan
