Opera "The Troubadour": content, video, interesting facts, history

D. Verdi opera "The Troubadour"

Giuseppe Verdi immediately drew attention to the unusual plot of the drama Antonio Garcia Gutierrez "The Troubadour". He attracted him with his romantic mood, bright colors, seething passions and emotionality. In addition, the work clearly traces the theme of the struggle, heroism and mental stability. Written on this plot opera "Troubadour"- it is a colorful and emotional work. It shows irreconcilable contrasts, clashes between the two opposing sides, as well as deep and incredibly beautiful feelings of the characters. The national flavor gives a special charm to music, because many melodies are very close to folk motifs. The libretto of the opera" The Troubadour "is written by a pen Salvatore Cammarano.

Summary of the opera Verdi "Troubadour" and a lot of interesting facts about this work, read on our page.

Summary of the "Troubadour"

All events in the opera unfold in the XV century in Spain (Vizcaya and Aragon).
The main characters of the opera are two brothers, Count di Luna and the troubadour Manrico, but they don’t even know about their close relationship and consider each other enemies. Count Lee is in love with the beautiful Leonora and tries to care for her. However, the girl does not reciprocate him, because her heart belongs to another - Manrico, with whom she met at a knightly tournament and crowned his head with a wreath. Since then, she often thinks about him and even sees him in her dreams.

Meanwhile, the old warrior Ferrando tells everyone about the circumstances under which the two brothers were separated. In fact, one of them was stolen by a gypsy Azuchena and thrown into a fire. But it turns out that on that day she burned her own child by mistake and began to bring up foster Manrico.

Both young men are trying to achieve the location of the girl Leonora. There is even a duel between them. Manrico plunges his opponent to the floor, but does not kill him, feeling that he is being held by some force.

It would seem that the opponent was defeated, but it was not there, it could not stop the cunning graph, and he decided to act again. This time he attacks the castle of Castellor, Prince of Biscay, who is forced to ask for help from Manrico. The prince calls the troubadour to help protect the castle from the encroachments of the Count di Luna. By happy coincidence, it is in this castle that his beloved Leonora is going to become a nun. The girl is in despair, because she believes that Manrico was dead. In the same castle in a hurry and Count di Luna, he intends to steal Leonora and marry her. There is a battle between the units of the brothers, and Leonora is incredibly happy, because she learned that her beloved Manrico is alive. Meanwhile, the earl's soldiers grabbed the troubadour's mother, Azuchen, and brought her to a military camp. In the castle, Manrico is preparing for his marriage to Leonora, but having learned that his mother was seized, he decides to storm the count's military camp. Unfortunately, his army was defeated, and he himself was captured and imprisoned in a prison tower awaiting execution.

Leonora is ready to do anything to save his beloved and offers the count to be with him if he lets go of Manrico. The happy Count di Luna immediately agrees, not realizing that the girl has already taken the deadly poison, so as not to fall to him. Leonora is escorted to Manriko's prison tower, and she convinces her lover to escape soon. However, the poison has already begun to act, and she dies in his arms. Graf di Luna, seeing this scene, comes to despair and, in a fit of anger, orders to execute his rival right there. He leads the gypsy Azuchen to the window so that she can see her son dying, but she throws a terrible phrase in his face that Manrico is his lost brother.

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Interesting Facts

• The plot of the opera is based on real events, which are described in a literary source.
  
• The plot is so fascinated Verdithat the music itself, he wrote it in just 29 days.
  
• The first production in Rome was surrounded by mysticism, because the night was unusually dark and stormy.
  
• The opera "The Troubadour" is one of the most popular in the world and is included in the gold collection of operas.
  
• While working on the opera, librettist Salvatore Cammarano dies suddenly, and the end of the third, as well as the fourth act, was completed by the poet E. Bardare.
  
• Many opera tunes have become the favorite revolutionary songs of the Italian people.
  
• The libretto of the performance is too complicated, even after carefully reading it, it is not understood how Manrico becomes a troubadour and, in fact, why the Spanish King himself has such honors.
  
• The plot of Troubadour is simply impossible to retell correctly and accurately, without having ever strayed. In Milan, even kept a bottle of champagne in a tavern near the theater "La Scala" for those who still manage to do it.
  
• To help the audience, the composer and the librettists introduced stories explaining what was happening on the stage.
  

• Verdi was well aware that his work turned out too gloomy, he confirmed in a letter to his friend C. Maffei.
  
• Miserere from the opera Troubadour, according to the composer himself, served as the prototype for the famous trial of Radamés from "Aida". Even there are similarities in the shouts of Amneris and Leonora.
  
• In 1949, the opera was filmed by director K. Gallone.
  
• With the opera "The Troubadour" is connected one amusing incident from the life of the composer. Having completed the work on the work, he decided to call on a musical critic who was always skeptical about Verdi and was considered a mediocre scribbler. Having lost to him some of the most successful numbers to his liking, the composer asked if the critic liked what he had heard. Of course, he defeated the music, calling it flat and uninteresting. Verdi was very happy to hear this, and rushed to shake hands with the stern critic, who was stunned by everything that happened. The composer noted that he was very happy and not at all disappointed, because his words mean that a new work awaits undoubted success.
  
• Another interesting fact is connected with the work of the great maestro. Once he was asked what kind of creation he considers the best. Without thinking, Verdi replied that the house he had built for elderly musicians.
• It is noteworthy that the complexity of the parties of the main characters, as well as their excessive emotionality, forced many theaters in the world to abandon the production of "Troubadour".
• Only a few world-famous performers: Pavarotti, Domingo, Callas, Caruso, Tebaldi, Netrebko really coped with the difficult parts.

Popular arias and numbers from the opera "The Troubadour"

Leonore Cavatina "tacea la notte placida" - listen

Song Azuceny "Stride la vampa" - listen

Leonora IV's aria "D'amor sull'ali rosee" - listen

Gypsy choir "Vedi! Le fosche notturne" - listen

The history of the creation of the "Troubadour"

The opera "The Troubadour" is based on the play by playwright Gutierrez, which was a great success presented to the public in Madrid in 1836. The romantic story, which is full of intrigue, fights, family secrets with an incredible dramatic denouement, immediately attracted the attention of Verdi. He admired the bright colors of drama, as well as incredibly acute situations with boiling passions and unsurpassed heroics of the struggle for personal freedom. Having carefully considered the plan, he began to write his next opera.

By the way, the idea of ​​creating the opera "The Troubadour" arose while working on another composer's masterpiece - "Rigoletto"It is worth noting that the work itself proceeded in a very difficult period of the composer’s life. It was at this time that he was experiencing the loss of his mother, and he was also agitated by problems with the Rigoletto production. The composer created the music rather quickly. The libretto was created by S. Kammarano, and it is considered that he slightly deepened the main intrigue of the opera, making it even more confusing. The sudden death of the librettist interrupted Verdi’s work on the score. Misia actions already working young poet L. Bardar, who enjoyed sketches Cammarano.

Productions

The first production took place in Rome, at the Apollo Theater on January 19, 1853, and immediately won incredible success with the public. Domestic admirers of the talent of the great Verdi were able to get acquainted with his next masterpiece, presented at the Bolshoi Theater in 1972, thanks to German director Erhard Fischer. The main roles were played by Y. Mazurok, T. Milashkina, E. Obraztsova, V. Piavko.

Already in 1993, the opera was resumed, only now in Italian and lasted in the repertoire until the end of the 90s. Many musicologists say that "Troubadour" is extremely rare in Russia due to extremely complex vocal parts. Among the modern productions it is worth noting the premiere of 2012, which was successfully held in the “New Opera”. A team from Italy worked on this version. The director was Marco Gandini, set designer Italo Grassi. The performance turned out to be quite traditional, not counting abstract set design: huge columns in the form of crystals, illuminated from the inside, which most likely symbolized the main characters. A large role was also assigned to the light "score".

Among the world of modern productions should be noted the premiere of the Salzburg Festival, held on August 15, 2014. In many countries, a live broadcast of the opera was carried out. The main parts in the performance were performed by such eminent vocalists as Anna Netrebko and Placido Domingo. The director of the opera is Alvis Hermanis.

Another modern production, which cannot be touched on, was successfully held in March 2016 at the Paris Opera Bastion. Directed by Alex Huye. The most talented vocalists, represented by Anna Netrebko and Yusif Eyvazov (though she performed in different compositions), as well as an incredible light show and set design gave particular significance to this version. The plot of the opera, it was decided to move during the First World War.

Extraordinarily expressive music Giuseppe Verdi, as well as the continuous intensity of passion in the opera makes the listeners to continuously monitor everything that happens on stage. We offer you to get acquainted with another masterpiece of this brilliant composer and see the opera "Troubadour".