Nabucco premieres in Milan

Verdi opera that became a symbol of the Risorgimento

The bill advertising the first staging
of Nabucco at La Scala in Milan

The opera Nabucco, with music by Giuseppe Verdi and a libretto by Temistocle Solera, was first performed on this day in 1842 at Teatro alla Scala in Milan.

The opera contains the famous chorus Va, pensiero, a lament for a lost homeland that many Italians now regard as their unofficial national anthem.

The opera and Verdi himself have become synonymous with the Risorgimento, the period in the 19th century when people worked to free the Italian states of foreign domination and unite them under the leadership of Victor Emmanuel, the King of Sardinia and Duke of Savoy.

It is said that during the last years of the Austrian occupation of Lombardia and the Veneto, for example, that Italian patriots adopted Viva Verdi as a slogan and rallying call, using the composer’s name as an acronym for 'Vittorio Emanuele Re d’Italia' - 'Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy'.

On the day of the composer’s funeral in Milan in 1901, a crowd of 300,000 people filled the streets and sang Va, pensiero, conducted by Arturo Toscanini, a moving event that showed how Verdi’s music had helped unite the Italian nation.

But Verdi nearly didn’t take up the offer to compose the music for Nabucco.

Verdi took up the offer to write the
music for Nabucco with reluctance

After a terrible two-year period, during which his young wife and two children had all died as a result of illnesses, Verdi had vowed never to compose music again.

During a chance meeting with Bartolomeo Merelli, La Scala’s impresario, Verdi was given a copy of Solera’s libretto, which had been rejected by another composer.

Verdi later recalled in his memoirs how he took the libretto home, threw it on the table with a violent gesture and it opened up in front of him. Verdi’‘s eye fell on the phrase, ‘Va, pensiero, sull’ali dorate’  - 'Fly, thought, on golden wings'.

He tried to ignore the libretto but eventually found himself sitting at the piano and setting the words to music.

It is claimed he was still reluctant about working on the score and tried to take the manuscript back to Merelli, but the impresario stuffed the libretto back in Verdi’s pocket, threw him out of his office and locked the door.

Verdi went home and continued to work on the music and by the autumn of 1841 the opera was complete.

The opening performance at La Scala on 9 March 1842 was an immediate success, establishing Verdi as a major composer. The opera is still regularly performed all over the world today.

Verdi's future wife, Giuseppina Strepponi,
was a member of the original cast

The original cast included the soprano Giuseppina Strepponi, who would later become Verdi's second wife.

Nabucco is named after King Nebuchadnezzar, who featured in the books of Jeremiah and Daniel in the Bible, and the opera follows the plight of the Jews he conquered and exiled. The chorus Va, pensiero - also known as the 'Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves' - captured the feeling of national pride among Italians at the time who were still living under Austrian domination.

In 1981 a journalist proposed replacing Italy’s official national anthem with Va, persiero. This never happened, but the political party Lega Nord - now La Lega - adopted it as its official hymn and the chorus is now sung at all party meetings.

In 2011, after conducting Va, pensiero at the Teatro dell’Opera in Rome, the conductor Riccardo Muti made a speech protesting about cuts in Italy’s arts budget and then invited the audience to sing along in support of culture and patriotism.

Milan's Teatro alla Scala, one of the world's most prestigious
opera houses, is right in the centre of the city

Travel tip:

Teatro alla Scala is in Piazza della Scala in the centre of Milan across the road from the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, an elegant arcade lined with cafes, shops and restaurants which was built to link Piazza della Scala with Piazza del Duomo, Milan’s cathedral square. La Scala has a fascinating museum that displays costumes and memorabilia from the history of opera. The entrance is in Largo Ghiringhelli. It is open every day except the Italian Bank Holidays and a few days when it is closed in December. Opening hours are from 9.00 to 12.30 and 1.30 to 5.30 pm.

Rome's Teatro dell'Opera, rebuilt in the 1920s by the
architect Marcello Piacentini, seats 1600 spectators

Travel tip:

The Teatro dell’Opera in Rome, where conductor Riccardo Muti invited the audience to join in the chorus Va, pensiero in 2011, is a 1600-seat opera house in Piazza Beniamino Gigli. It was originally opened in 1880 as the Costanzi Theatre and has undergone several changes of name and many improvements over the years.

Rome hotels by Booking.com

Also on this day:

1454: The birth of explorer Amerigo Vespucci

1809: The birth of statesman and winemaker Bettino Ricasoli

1908: The founding of the Milan football club Internazionale

1948: The birth of politician Emma Bonino


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Giuseppina Strepponi – soprano

Death of the woman who inspired Donizetti and Verdi

Giuseppina Strepponi in a portrait that can
be seen at the museum at Teatro alla Scala

Opera singer Giuseppina Strepponi died on this day in 1897 at the village of Sant’Agata in the province of Piacenza in Emilia-Romagna.

She was the second wife of the composer Giuseppe Verdi and is often credited with helping him achieve his first successes, having starred in several of his early operas.

Strepponi was born Clelia Maria Josepha Strepponi in Lodi, a little over 40km south-east of Milan, in 1815.

Her father was the organist at Monza Cathedral and also a composer and he gave her piano lessons when she was very young. At the age of 15 she was enrolled at the Milan Conservatory and she won first prize for singing in her final year.

Strepponi made her professional debut in 1834 at the Teatro Orfeo in Taranto and enjoyed her first success the following spring in Trieste, singing the title role in Rossini’s Matilde di Shabran. She quickly became a celebrity, singing Donizetti, Bellini and Rossini roles all over Italy to great acclaim.

A portrait of Giuseppe Verdi in 1839, the
year of his first opera, Oberto 

She made her debut at Teatro alla Scala in Milan in 1839 as Leonora in the first production of Giuseppe Verdi’s first opera, Oberto.  Her strong performance was one of the main reasons the opera was received so well.

Despite suffering illnesses, Strepponi continued to be a popular singer in the early 1840s. She sang the title role in Donizetti’s Adelia in 1841, which he had written specifically for her. In 1842 she received acclaim for her performance of Abigaille in the world premiere of Verdi’s Nabucco at La Scala.

By 1844 she was beginning to experience vocal problems and she had a disastrous season in Palermo in 1845 when she was booed by the audience.

Most of her performances after that were in Verdi operas and she retired from the stage in February 1846 at the age of 31.

Her voice had been damaged by overwork during a career in which she had several affairs and carried on working through at least three known pregnancies.

It was only after she retired and moved to Paris to become a singing teacher that what had been a professional relationship with Verdi blossomed into something more. A widower whose first wife, Margherita, had died young, Verdi visited her there and they began a romance.

The couple returned to Italy in 1849 and began living together in Busseto, Verdi’s home town. She was shunned in the town and at church because they were not married and so the couple moved to a house in the nearby village of Sant’Agata, which is today known as Villa Verdi.

Strepponi helped Verdi’s work by translating for him and supplying comments and criticism while he was composing.

The Villa Verdi, where Strepponi and Verdi lived for
almost half a century before her death in 1897

They were finally married in 1859 and lived together happily until Strepponi became bedridden through arthritis. She was 82 when she died from pneumonia on November 14, 1897, and was initially buried in Milan.

Verdi had left instructions in his will that he wanted to be buried next to her, but after his death he was buried in another cemetery in Milan.

However, so they could be together once again, on February 26, 1901 their bodies were both transferred to be buried in the oratory at the Casa di Riposo, a retirement home for musicians Verdi had created. At the ceremony, Arturo Toscanini directed a choir singing the famous Va, pensiero chorus from Nabucco.

Travel tip:

Villa Verdi, where Strepponi died, is a house Verdi owned from 1848 till his death in 1901 in the village of Sant’Agata in the province of Piacenza. He extended the original house and developed the park around the house, planting many exotic trees. Today visitors can view some of the rooms, including Strepponi’s room, with its original bed, where she died in 1897.

Hotels in Busseto by venere.com

The Basilica Cattedrale della Vergine Assunta
dominates Lodi's Piazza della Vittoria 

Travel tip:

Lodi, the birthplace of Strepponi, is a city in Lombardy, to the south-east of Milan. The town’s main square, Piazza della Vittoria, has porticoes on all four sides and is listed by the Italian Touring Club among the most beautiful squares in Italy. In 1796, in his first major battle, the young Napoleon Bonaparte defeated the Austrians in the Battle of Lodi.

Hotels in Lodi by venere.com

More reading:

The death of Giuseppe Verdi - how Italy mourned his loss

Gaetano Donizetti: the greatest composer of lyrical 
opera

How opera brought fame and wealth to Gioachino Rossini

Also on this day:

1812: The birth of Aleardo Aleardi, the poet who was an important figure in the Risorgimento movement



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