Giuseppe Verdi

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Giuseppe Verdi (1813 – 1901) (or Joe Green, if you like) was perhaps the biggest name in romantic-period Italian Opera.

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His operas include:

• Aïda (known for the Triumphal March)
  • remade as the Elton John musical Aida in modern times
• Un Ballo In Maschera
• Don Carlo
• Falstaff (based on Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor)
• La Forza Del Destino
• Macbeth
• Nabucco
• Otello (someone was a Shakespeare fanboy)
• Rigoletto (source of "La donna e mobile", a tune synonymous with opera for even non-fans)
• Simon Boccanegra
• La Traviata (based on La Dame aux camelias by the younger Alexandre Dumas. It has Il Brindisi aka the Drinking Song and Sempre libera)
• Il Trovatore (the Anvil Chorus and "Di quella pira")
• I Vespri Siciliani

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Tropes associated to Verdi's works:

• Author Appeal
• Badass Baritone: Some of the most famous baritone roles come from here. Sparafucile from Rigoletto comes to mind.
  • Sparafucile is a bass. Better examples are Rigoletto himself, Count di Luna, Rodrigo, Nabucco, Iago.
• Banned in China / Americans Hate Tingle: Even with its locale changed to Boston, Un Ballo in Maschera was never performed in Sweden until the 1920's. When it was performed there, the Swedish derided it as historically inaccurate.
• Bowdlerization: Un ballo in maschera and Rigoletto had to be re-written to mask the similarities to a real life royal murder and some plays inspired on it (Ballo) and a play by Victor Hugo (Rigoletto)
• Broken Bird: More than one of his female leads, like Violetta from La Traviata or Aïda.
• Deus Angst Machina
• Driven to Suicide - Spurned Into Suicide - The Uriah Gambit: Many causes of death in his operas.
• Follow the Leader: His early operas were inspired by Rossini's and Donizetti's.
• Getting Crap Past the Radar: It has been quite discussed among scholars if the famous Va pensiero from Nabucco is or not a thinly-veiled allegory to the war between the Austrian Empire and the Italian territories and the wish for an Italian Unification.
• Historical Fiction
• Melodrama
• Old Shame: Most of the operas that predate Rigoletto. Verdi himself considered Alzira very awful.
• Poor Communication Kills: Literally, many times.
• Star-Crossed Lovers
• What Could Have Been: among others, he planned an opera based on King Lear and another on Victor Hugo's Ruy Blas.
• William Shakespeare
• The Woobie: Many.

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Tropes associated to Verdi's life:

• Badass Beard
• Cool Old Guy: Verdi came out of semi-retirement to write Otello at the age of 74, and followed it up with his first successful comedy, Falstaff, which premiered when he was 80.
• Creator Couple
• Hot for Student: His first wife, Margherita Barezzi, was his pupil.
• The Muse: His second wife, Giuseppina Strapponi, was a famous opera singer who had worked with him.