www.pov.bc.

ca

Music by Giuseppe Verdi

Libretto by Arrigo Boito

Introduction and Resource Guide

for Pacific Opera Victoria’s Production, October, 2015

SEASON SPONSOR STUDENT DRESS REHEARSAL PROGRAM PRODUCTION SPONSORS

SEASON UNDERWRITERS 30 ANDYOUNGER

YOUTH, EDUCATION, & ARTIST TRAINING

Pacific Opera Victoria
NRS Foundation
925 Balmoral Road
KOERNER Moss Rock Park McLean STEWART Quail Rock
Foundation FOUNDATION FOUNDATION FUND Foundation Victoria, BC V8T 1A7
Phone: 250.382.1641
PUBLIC FUNDING Box Office: 250.385.0222
www.pov.bc.ca
Welcome to Pacific Opera Victoria!

This Guide to Verdi’s Otello has been created for anyone who would like to explore the opera in more
detail. The opera experience can be made more meaningful and enjoyable when you have the
opportunity to learn about the opera before attending the performance.
The guide may also be used to help teachers prepare students for their visit to the opera. It is our hope
that teachers will be able to use this material to expand students’ understanding of opera, literature,
history, and the fine arts. These materials may be copied and distributed to students.
Please visit http://www.pov.bc.ca/otello.html to download this guide or to find more information about
the opera, including musical selections from POV’s Best of YouTube and artist biographies. POV Guides
for other operas are also available for download.

Please Note: The Dress Rehearsal is the last opportunity the singers will have on stage to work with the
orchestra before Opening Night. Since vocal demands are so great on opera singers, some singers choose
not to sing in full voice during the Dress Rehearsal in order to preserve their voice for opening night.

Contents
Welcome to Pacific Opera Victoria! ______________________________________________________ 1
Cast and Creative Team _______________________________________________________________ 2
Introduction and Synopsis _____________________________________________________________ 3
The Music of Otello ___________________________________________________________________ 6
From Othello to Otello: The Alchemy of Verdi and Boito _____________________________________ 11
Giuseppe Verdi _____________________________________________________________________ 14
Arrigo Boito ________________________________________________________________________ 20
Resources and Links _________________________________________________________________ 21
Student Activities ___________________________________________________________________ 24

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 1
 Otello
Music by Giuseppe Verdi
Libretto by Arrigo Boito
Based on the tragedy Othello by William Shakespeare
First Performance February 5, 1887, at La Scala, Milan
Student Dress Rehearsal, Tuesday, October 13, at 7 pm
Performances October 15, 17, 23, 2015, at 8 pm
Wednesday, October 21, at 7 pm
Sunday, October 25, at 2:30 pm

Royal Theatre, Victoria, BC

In Italian with English surtitles

A Co-Production with Opéra de Montréal

Cast and Creative Team

Cast in order of Vocal Appearance

Montano, previous Governor of Cyprus .................................. Alexander Dobson

Cassio, a Captain, serving under Otello ................................... Adam Luther
Iago, Otello’s ensign................................................................. Todd Thomas
Roderigo, a Venetian gentleman ............................................. Matthew Bruce
Otello, a Moorish General, Governor of Cyprus ...................... Kristian Benedikt
Desdemona, Otello’s wife ....................................................... Leslie Ann Bradley
Emilia, Iago’s wife and Desdemona’s servant.......................... Lynne McMurtry
Lodovico, Ambassador of the Venetian Republic ................... Jeremy Bowes

Chorus of Venetian soldiers and sailors and Cypriot townsfolk

Artistic Director and Conductor .............................................. Timothy Vernon

Director .................................................................................... Glynis Leyshon
Production Designer ................................................................ Peter Hartwell
Lighting Designer ..................................................................... Guy Simard
Fight Director ........................................................................... Jacques Lemay
Projection Designer ................................................................. Jamie Nesbitt
Chorus Master ........................................................................ Giuseppe Pietraroia
Principal Coach ........................................................................ Tatiana Vassilieva
Répétiteur ................................................................................ Csinszka Rédai
Artist in Residence ................................................................... Heather Jarvie
Stage Manager ......................................................................... Sara Robb
Assistant Stage Managers ........................................................ Emma Hammond
................................................................................................. Christopher Sibbald

With the Victoria Symphony and the Pacific Opera Chorus

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 2
Introduction

Man is the fool of fortune ...

Death is nothingness, Heaven an old wives' tale.
Otello is an illustrious general with an adoring wife, until Iago, driven by hatred and malign nihilism, sets out
to destroy him and tear apart his marriage. With insinuation and lies, with perfect malevolence and false
kindness, Iago plays on his general's vulnerability until Otello can trust nothing he sees or hears.
We want to cry out Stop! But the tragedy unfolds inexorably, and a love born in hope spirals into violence
and desolation.
In their monumental adaptation of Shakespeare's iconic play, composer Giuseppe Verdi and librettist Arrigo
Boito distill Shakespeare’s play into a fusion of poetry and music, creating a tragedy to make heaven weep.
This original production of the opera is a co-production with Pacific Opera Victoria and Opéra de Montréal. It
is directed by Glynis Leyshon, with set and costume design by Peter Hartwell.

Synopsis
Act 1
The opera is set on Cyprus, an outpost of the Venetian empire, which has been under attack by the Ottoman
(Turkish) Empire.
The people of Cyprus watch and pray as Otello's ship fights its way to shore
through a violent thunderstorm. When the ship finally makes it to port,
battered, but safe, Otello comes ashore in triumph and announces that he has
defeated the Turks in battle (Esultate! Rejoice!)
While everyone celebrates, Iago, bitter that Otello has promoted Cassio to
captain ahead of him, begins plotting to destroy both Otello and Cassio.
Knowing that Roderigo is infatuated with Otello’s wife Desdemona, Iago
assures him that she will eventually tire of Otello. He then insinuates that
Cassio too has designs on Desdemona and enlists Roderigo to help
orchestrate Cassio's downfall.
Iago goads Cassio into drinking too much (Inaffia l’ugola!), then has Roderigo
pick a quarrel with him. As the situation turns violent, Montano intervenes
and Cassio wounds him. A brawl ensues, and Iago sends Roderigo to sound
the alarm.
Otello storms in (Abbasso… le spade!), and demands to know what has
happened. Iago professes that he is utterly mystified.
Above, Tenor Francesco Otello’s fury increases when he sees that Montano has been wounded and
Tamagno as Otello in the
that the commotion has wakened Desdemona. He demotes Cassio, orders a
original 1887 production at
La Scala, Milan gloating Iago to restore peace, and sends everyone home.
Finally, in the quiet of the night, Otello is alone with Desdemona (Già nella
notte densa). Together they remember how Otello won her love with stories of his desert homeland, his life
in exile, and his exploits as a warrior. He tells her, You loved me for the dangers I had passed, and I loved you
that you did pity them. They pray that their love will never change, and they kiss tenderly.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 3
Act 2
Iago commisserates with Cassio about his demotion and suggests he ask
Desdemona to intercede with Otello. As Cassio goes to find Desdemona, Iago
declares his belief that God is cruel, man is evil, and life ends with death and
nothingness (Credo in un Dio crudel / I believe in a cruel God who created me in
his image.)
Iago then watches as Cassio and Desdemona talk and, when Otello enters,
mutters to himself, I like it not (Ciò m'accora). Otello is instantly curious, but
Iago evades his questions while hinting that Cassio is not to be trusted.
As Otello presses him to speak plainly, Iago warns him, Beware, my lord, of
jealousy!
A group of children and townspeople present Desdemona with flowers and wish
her happiness. Otello watches lovingly, exclaiming, If she is false to me, then
Above, Baritone Victor Heaven mocks itself!
Maurel sang Iago at the
Desdemona joins Otello and pleades with him to forgive Cassio. Otello
1887 première of Otello.
impatiently puts her off, but she persists. When he complains of a headache, she
tries to bind his head with her handkerchief, but he throws it down. Iago’s wife Emilia picks up the
handkerchief and, in a brief, angry exchange, Iago demands that she give it to him; when she refuses, he
seizes it forcibly.
Otello sends everyone away, but Iago remains, watching Otello brood. Iago observes that his poison is
working and makes plans to hide the handkerchief in Cassio’s lodgings. He then approaches Otello, who
lashes out at him for ruining his happiness. Iago offers to resign his commission, grumbling that it’s
dangerous to be honest. Otello relents, but insists that he needs proof of Desdemona’s infidelity.
Iago confides that once he overheard Cassio talking in his sleep (Era la notte), dreaming passionately of
Desdemona and murmuring that they needed to keep their love hidden. It was only a dream, he cautions, but
there is other evidence: the previous day he saw Cassio carrying Desdemona's handkerchief.
That handkerchief, Otello tells him, was the first token of love he ever gave Desdemona. Enraged, Otello
swears vengeance on the couple, and Iago eagerly pledges to help (Sì, pel ciel marmoreo giuro! Yes, by the
marble heaven I swear!).

Act 3
Iago promises Otello that he will provide proof of Cassio’s betrayal: he will engage Cassio in conversation
while Otello secretly observes.
As Iago goes to find Cassio, Desdemona enters and lovingly greets her husband (Dio ti giocondi). When she
begins talking of Cassio, Otello asks her to bind his aching head with the handkerchief that he first gave her.
When she explains that she doesn’t have it, he orders her to fetch it, but she mistakes his insistence as a ploy
to avoid the subject of Cassio and continues to press for his reinstatement. Otello then accuses her of
infidelity. Baffled, she asserts her innocence, but with a final cruel insult, he sends her away.
Exhausted and incoherent with rage and grief, Otello laments (Dio! mi potevi) that he could have borne every
possible torment save the loss of Desdemona’s love. He then cries out that she must confess her crime and
then die!
Iago returns and tells Otello to hide as he gossips with Cassio. The conversation is quite innocent: Cassio
wonders if Desdemona has persuaded Otello to reinstate him, talks cheerfully about his sweetheart Bianca,
and shows Iago the handkerchief that an unknown admirer has left in his lodging. But Iago stage-manages
their discussion so that Otello catches only those words and gestures that appear to incriminate Cassio and
Desdemona.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 4
After Cassio leaves, Otello asks Iago how he should kill Desdemona. Iago suggests that Otello strangle her in
the bed where she has sinned and offers to take care of Cassio himself. Otello promotes Iago to Captain.
Everyone except Cassio gathers to receive Lodovico, the Venetian ambassador. When Lodovico asks why
Cassio is not present, Iago replies that Otello is angry with him, and Desdemona expresses confidence that
he’ll soon be back in Otello’s good graces. Otello mutters to her to stop babbling. When she apologizes, he
moves to strike her but is stopped by Lodovico.
The ambassador has brought orders for Otello to return to Venice and for Cassio to replace him as governor
of Cyprus. Otello assumes that Desdemona is weeping because she must leave Cassio and shocks the crowd
by losing his temper and pushing her to the ground.
Meanwhile, Iago works furiously to salvage his plans, urging Otello to kill Desdemona that very night and
promising to deal with Cassio himself. Seeing that Roderigo is mourning Desdemona’s imminent departure,
he points out that Otello would have to stay in Cyprus if something were to happen to Cassio. Roderigo
agrees to kill Cassio.
Otello orders everyone to leave. Tormented by thoughts of Cassio and Desdemona, he faints as Iago watches
in triumph.

Act 4
While preparing for bed, Desdemona sings the mournful Willow Song about a woman abandoned by her
lover. As Emilia leaves for the night, Desdemona gives way to her terror, crying out and embracing her.
Before going to sleep, Desdemona kneels and says an Ave Maria.
Otello enters, kisses Desdemona, and asks if she has prayed, adding that she should confess her sins, for he
would not want to kill her soul. She tells him her only sin is loving him. He accuses her of loving Cassio, who,
he says, is now dead. She begs him to let her live for just a little longer, but he strangles her.
As Emilia arrives with news that Cassio has killed Roderigo, the dying Desdemona softly calls out that she is
innocent, but that Otello is not to blame. Otello tells Emilia he killed Desdemona because she was Cassio’s
mistress. Emilia calls him a fool for believing Iago and summons help.
As the others arrive, the story comes out: Emilia and Cassio tell what they know of the handkerchief, and
Montano reports that the dying Roderigo told him of Iago’s plot. Iago flees.
Otello goes to Desdemona (Niun mi tema), stabs himself and kisses her one last time before he dies.

Maureen Woodall

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 5
The Music of Otello
An Opera is not a play; our art lives by elements unknown to spoken tragedy. An atmosphere that has been
destroyed can be created all over again. Eight bars are enough to restore a sentiment to life; a rhythm can
re-establish a character; music is the most omnipotent of all the arts; it has a logic all its own — both freer
and more rapid that the logic of spoken thought, and much more eloquent.
Boito in a letter to Verdi, October 1880, during work on the libretto for Otello

Otello is the only opera to challenge a Shakespeare tragedy and emerge undimmed by the comparison… Like
all supreme works of art it remains untouched by time, reflecting new facets of truth in each generation.
Winton Dean

The Youtube links and musical discussion below can also be accessed at
http://www.pov.bc.ca/otello-music.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=7&v=srCGSB1okAE
Act I: Otello's Entrance. Esultate! (Rejoice!)
The opera opens with a thunderstorm, vividly depicted by the orchestra.
The people of Cyprus watch in terror as Otello's ship approaches through
the darkness and the wind. Everyone prays that it will land safely, except
Iago, who wishes it to the bottom of the sea. Finally, the ship makes it to
port, battered, but safe.
Now Otello makes what is surely the most magnificent entrance in
opera, as he comes ashore to announce that he has defeated the Turks in
battle.
Esultate! Rejoice!
The glory of the Muslims is buried in the deep. Above, Mario del Monaco as Otello
sings Esultate. 1958 RAI telecast.
With heaven's help we are victorious.
What our arms spared, the sea and storm have vanquished.
Musicologist James Hepokoski comments on this riveting moment:
It is only here – and fleetingly – that we perceive an unflawed hero. Otello enters ... as a demigod, produced
out of the raging struggle of the earth, the air, and the water ... By sheer force Otello's music grasps, bends,
and resolves music heard in the storm.
Mario del Monaco is Otello in this 1958 RAI telecast, conducted by Tullio Serafin.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIl0RLJ2oBQ
Act I:Love Duet. Già Nella Notte Densa (Now in the dark of night )
Otello and Desdemona are finally alone together. The victory
celebrations have ended. Otello has broken up a brawl and sent
everyone home. Now, the night is quiet, and peace is at hand.
Già nella notte densa s'estingue ogni clamor
Now in the dark of night every sound has been silenced.
My heart's tumult has been calmed by your touch.
Let war thunder. Let the world be engulfed
If after every terrible tempest comes such immense love!
The couple recall how they met and how Otello entranced Above, Barbara Fritolli and Placido
Desdemona with stories of his turbulent life, valiant battles, and daring Domingo sing the love duet in a 2001
production from La Scala.
deeds:

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 6
Desdemona:
Poi mi guidavi ai fulgidi deserti,
Then you led me to blazing deserts,
to the burning sands of your native land.
You told of the torments you had suffered
And of your chains when you were sold into slavery
Otello:
Ingentilia di lagrime la storia il tuo bel viso e il labbro di sospir
When I told my story, your lovely face softened with tears
and the glory of heaven and the stars shone down on my darkness...
You loved me for the dangers I had passed,
and I loved you that you did pity them.
Placido Domingo is Otello, with Barbara Frittoli as Desdemona in this 2001 production from La Scala,
conducted by Riccardo Muti.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJXeXaKlWZM
Act II: Iago's Credo. Credo in un Dio crudel (I believe in a cruel God)
Even as the victory celebrations get underway in the first act, Iago has begun fomenting conflict: Otello has
passed him over for promotion in favour of Cassio, and Iago is bent on destroying both of them.
In his letters, Verdi described Iago as the devil who sets everything in motion, and he even considered naming
the opera after him. A brilliant, artful puppetmaster, Iago whips up conflict and incites jealousy and murder,
yet wins the trust of those around him. He doesn't come across as a mustache-twirling villain. He is suavely
believable, as Verdi himself pointed out:
[Iago's] manner would be absent-minded, nonchalant, indifferent about everything, incredulous, witty
... a personality like that might deceive everybody, even his own wife.
Iago articulates his fury, malevolence, and self-hatred in his Credo, a dramatic soliloquy whose opening
phrase, Credo in un Dio crudel, is a blasphemous echo of the Credo that is part of the Catholic mass (Credo in
unum deum, Patrem omnipotentem, factorem caeli et terrae – I believe in one God, the Father almighty,
maker of heaven and earth).
Credo in un Dio crudel … I believe in a cruel God
who created me in his image and whom I name in my wrath.
From some vile germ of nature or some atom I was born.
I am evil because I am human.
I feel the primeval slime in me.
... whatever evil I think or do is decreed by Fate.
I believe the just man to be a mocking actor in face and heart;
that all his being is a lie,
And I believe man is fortune's fool
from the germ of the cradle to the worm of the grave.
After all this folly comes Death.
E poi?... e poi? La Morte è il Nulla, è vecchia fola il Ciel. Above, Leo Nucci sings Iago’s Credo in
this 2001 La Scala production.
And then?... And then?
Death is nothingness, heaven an old wives' tale.
The Credo is Boito’s own creation. It has no counterpart in Shakespeare’s play. Shakespeare’s Iago proposes
multiple reasons for his campaign against Othello and Cassio (being passed over for promotion, a suspicion
that Othello is having an affair with his wife), yet none really justifies his actions; Samuel Taylor Coleridge
famously called Iago’s rationalizations the motive-hunting of a motiveless malignity.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 7
But Boito created an explicit expression of Iago’s innate malignity, writing to Verdi that he had devised a sort
of evil Credo … See what villainies I have put into his mouth. Verdi’s reaction: Most beautiful this Credo; most
powerful and wholly Shakespearian!
Iago’s blasphemy is two-fold. Not only does he proclaim his belief in an evil god, but his description of the vile
germ and primeval slime from which he has issued is an echo of Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection.
Darwin’s book, On the Origin of Species, had been published in 1859, just a quarter of a century before Otello
was written; the theory was considered blasphemous by many (though not all) religious authorities.
As Journalist Arun Rath, host of NPR’s All Things Considered, expressed it, Iago believes in a nasty world of
nature, survival of the cruelest, and that morality and heaven are a joke: The dark side of the post-Darwin
world that was scary to Verdi's generation.
Yet intermingled with Iago’s psychopathy is profound despair. One can perhaps spare a fleeting moment of
pity for someone whose self-disgust allows him to believe only in his own soullessness.
Leo Nucci is Iago in this 2001 production from La Scala, conducted by Riccardo Muti. Nucci does not end his
Credo with the fiendish laugh that has become a performance tradition (although the laugh is in neither the
score nor Boito's stage instructions. The subtitles are in French.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=3&v=NpmrFaW0VE4
Act II: Otello and Iago's Duet.
Sì, pel ciel marmoreo giuro! (Yes, by the marble heaven I swear!)
One of the most electrifying moments in the opera is the vengeance duet
between Otello and Iago.
Iago's insidious hints and lies have finally all but convinced Otello that
Desdemona is having an affair with Cassio. Otello swears vengeance on the
couple, and Iago, ever at his service, avidly pledges to help.
Canadian tenor Jon Vickers, considered one of the finest Otellos of the
20th century, is formidable in this legendary 1978 performance at the Cornel MacNeil (left) and Jon Vickers
Metropolitan Opera. Cornel MacNeil is Iago, and James Levine conducts (right) sing Si, pel ciel
the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=54&v=cda7XKZVT68
Act III: Otello’s Aria.
Dio! mi potevi (God, you could have thrown every evil at me)
Iago’s lies, Desdemona’s advocacy on behalf of Cassio, and the evidence
of the handkerchief have finally convinced Otello that Desdemona is
unfaithful. Exhausted by grief and pain, he sings of his desolation and
loss.
The first part of this aria is a series of broken, almost incoherent vocal
fragments. Only as he recalls the joy that Desdemona brought him, that
he has now lost (Ma, o pianto, o duol), does the music move from
monotone into melody.
Dio! mi potevi scagliar tutti i mali
God, you could have thrown every evil at me,
every misery and shame, Kristian Benedikt sings Dio! Mi potevi
you could have made all my triumphs rubble and lies. in a 2011 production at Lithuanian
And I would have borne that cruel cross National Opera.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 8
of anguish and shame with patience
and submitted to the will of heaven.
Ma, o pianto, o duol
But, oh tears, oh sorrow!
The vision that gave me joy and quieted my soul
has been wrenched from me.
That sun has gone out,
that smile that filled my soul with life and happiness.
Mercy, you angel of grace with the rosy smile,
cover your holy face with the horrible mask of hell!
Ah, damnation!
Let her confess the crime and then die!
Confession! The proof!
Kristian Benedikt is Otello in thie 2011 production of Lithuanian National Opera, Vilnius. Mr. Bendikt
performs the role in Pacific Opera Victoria’s production.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2WiXZpr_18
Act IV: Desdemona’s aria. La canzon del salice (The Willow Song)
Otello, who has been lashing out at Desdemona with increasing
cruelty, has commanded her to go to bed and wait for him. As she
prepares for bed with the help of her maid Emilia, Desdemona
expresses her profound sadness and despair. She tells of her mother's
maid, Barbara, who was abandoned by her lover and used to sing a
song that tonight is haunting Desdemona – the mournful Willow Song:
“Piangea cantando nell'erma landa, piangea la mesta,
O Salce! Salce! Salce!"
"She wept as she sang on the lonely heath, the poor girl wept,
O Willow, Willow, Willow! She sat with her head upon her breast, Lianna Haroutounian sings The Willow
Willow, Willow, Willow! Song in a 2014 production at the
Come sing! Come sing! Teatro San Carlo di Napoli
The green willow shall be my garland."
At one point Desdemona is startled by a sound, and her fear becomes apparent. Emilia assures her it is just
the wind. Desdemona finishes the song.
"Io per amarlo e per morir
Cantiamo! cantiamo!
Salce! Salce! Salce!"
Emilia, addio.
"I to love him and to die.
Come sing! Come sing!
Willow! Willow! Willow!"
Emilia, farewell.
Her final Good Night is full of dread, and, as Emilia turns to leave, Desdemona gives way to her terror, crying
out and embracing her.
Armenian soprano Lianna Haroutounian is Desdemona in this 2014 production at the Teatro San Carlo di
Napoli, conducted by Nicola Luisotti.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 9
https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=8&v=JOMKv9fNz-0
Act IV: Desdemona’s prayer. Ave Maria
Finally alone, Desdemona says a prayer before going to bed. Devout, full of humility, tender, foreboding, with
a sense of gathering doom and sadness, her Ave Maria (Hail Mary) is a counterpart – and a stark contrast – to
the other “prayer” in the opera, Iago’s Credo. Like the Credo, the Ave Maria is not found in Shakespeare’s
play, but was added to the opera by Boito.
Like the Credo, too, the Ave Maria begins on a single repeated note that evokes the monotone of traditional
sacred chant.
Ave Maria, piena di grazia,
Hail Mary, full of grace,
chosen among wives and maidens art thou,
blessed be the fruit, o blessed one,
of thy womb, Jesus.
Pray for the one who kneels in prayer before you,
pray for the sinner, for the one who is innocent,
and for the weak and oppressed, and for the mighty,
also wretched, show thy mercy.
Pray for the one who bows his head under injustice and under misfortune;
for us, pray thou for us,
pray for us always and at the hour of our death, Renata Tebaldi sings the Ave
pray for us, pray for us, pray. Maria in a 1961 recording with
Amen! the Wiener Philharmoniker.

Renata Tebaldi sings the Ave Maria in a 1961 recording with the Wiener Philharmoniker, conducted by
Herbert von Karajan.

What is noteworthy throughout the opera is that many of the other musical selections also begin with a
repeated one-note melody – not only the Credo and Ave Maria, but the love duet (Già nella notte densa), the
oath duet (Sì, pel ciel marmoreo giuro!), Otello’s Act 3 aria (Dio! mi potevi), and his final aria, Niun mi tema
(Let no one fear me).
Each of these solos and duets begins with a single repeated note; each is instantly recognizable simply
through its rhythm. In each, the character transmutes an emotional situation into a startlingly memorable
vocal line expressed in a kind of emotional Morse code, before moving from monotone into melody and into
yet more expressive lyricism.
Meanwhile, the orchestra moves around and below the vocal line, informing its meaning, infusing it with
melody, atmosphere, nuance. It is quite unlike traditional operatic song (even unlike earlier Verdi), which
relied on the voice for the melody, the orchestra for an accompanying rhythmic pulse.
In Otello this byplay of melody, rhythm, harmony, and orchestral colour enriches quite marvelously the
drama, subtlety, and beauty of the score.

Maureen Woodall

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 10
From Othello to Otello
The Alchemy of Verdi and Boito
It has been said that any production of Otello is an event.
The reason lies both in the astounding brilliance of the opera
itself and in the enormous challenges of marshalling the
instrumental and vocal forces and the cast to carry it off.
When the peerless team of Giuseppe Verdi and Arrigo Boito
took on one of Shakespeare's most compelling dramas and
forged it into an opera, the result was what many consider
Italian opera's greatest tragedy. (Shortly afterward, the pair
would gleefully write the greatest comic opera in the Italian
repertoire – Falstaff.) Boito (left) and Verdi (right), c.1892

In common with Verdi and Boito, POV artistic director Timothy Vernon has an abiding love for Shakespeare.
And in Othello he finds Shakespeare's greatest poetic expression, with its extraordinary level of diction,
consistent invention of thrilling metaphors, and high level of dramatic inevitability. Here is Shakespeare at the
pinnacle of his power.
Verdi loved Shakespeare all his life, although he didn't speak English and relied on Italian translations to
convey to him some glimmer of the Bard's poetic and literary achievement.
Only late in his life did a librettist come along who was gifted (and diplomatic) enough to entice Verdi, now in
his late 60s, semi-retired, and resting comfortably on his laurels, to take on another opera. With the
connivance of Verdi's publisher Ricordi (who knew that if anything could seduce him into composing again, it
was Shakespeare), Boito drafted a libretto for Otello without a commitment from the composer. Verdi
swallowed the bait, and after eight years of on-again, off-again work, Otello premiered in 1887, when Verdi
was 73.
In creating the opera, Boito distilled some 3500 lines from Shakespeare’s play into a mere 800 vocal lines,
eliminating Shakespeare’s entire first act, which was set in Venice, concentrating the action in Cyprus, and
compressing the drama and the sense of relentless inevitability.
The opera’s plot and characters follow the play very closely, and Boito kept much of Shakespeare’s
language. Anyone who knows a little of the play will recognize some of the phrases.
These beautiful lines of Othello’s are rescued from Act I of the play to form the core of the opera’s gorgeous
love duet.
She loved me for the dangers I had passed, And I loved her that she did pity them –
Iago’s insidious
Oh, beware, my lord, of jealousy! It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock the meat it feeds on
finds its echo in the opera:
Beware, my lord, of jealousy! ‘tis a dark hydra, malignant, blind. It poisons itself with its own venom.
Otello’s call for vengeance and the spine-tingling oath duet are straight out of the play. Shakespeare’s
Othello cries out:
Oh, that the slave [Cassio] had forty thousand lives!
One is too poor, too weak for my revenge…
All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven. 'Tis gone….
Now, by yon marble heaven,
In the due reverence of a sacred vow
I here engage my words.
While Boito’s Otello exclaims:
O, that God had given him a thousand lives!
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 11
 One is too poor a prey for my revenge!...
All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven.
Watch me...’tis gone!
Now, by yond marble heaven!
By the jagged lightning-flash!...
shall thunder-bolts soon rain
from this hand that I raise outstretched!
When Iago chimes in, pledging to join forces with Otello in
vengeance, he proclaims, in the play:
Do not rise yet. Witness, you ever-burning lights above,
Witness that here Iago doth give up
The execution of his wit, hands, heart,
To wronged Othello’s service. Let him command,
And to obey shall be in me remorse, Model for a set design for Otello, created for
What bloody business ever. an 1895 Paris production by Marcel Jambon.
His words in the opera:
Do not rise yet! Witness, you sun that I gaze on,…
that to Othello I do consecrate ardently heart, hands and soul
even though on bloody business his will be bent!
There are differences. Most prominent among them are the removal of the first act in Venice; the opening
storm, offstage in Shakespeare, but front and centre in the opera; and the addition of the sublime love duet
(using some of Shakespeare’s language), Iago’s sinister Credo, and Desdemona’s poignant Ave Maria.
Between them, Verdi and Boito built an orchestral and vocal landscape for Shakespeare’s poetry and
created a musical drama that is at least as gripping as the play.
An oddity about opera is that composers get the lion's share of the glory. The luckless librettist is usually
ignored – often deservedly, for opera is strewn with bad libretti, the pain multiplied by clumsy translations.
Otello is an exception, acclaimed as much for Boito's masterful libretto as for Verdi's astonishing score –
this despite the fact that Boito too understood little English and worked mostly from a French translation. Yet
Boito's distillation of the play and Verdi's fusion of words and music resulted in an opera that is, as Timothy
observes, brilliant with chiaroscuro vividness in the writing – a match for Shakespeare's searing poetry.
How then could Timothy Vernon resist staging Otello in Victoria during a season that marks the 400th
anniversary of Shakespeare's death?
He admits it's an audacious project: It means stepping beyond what looks like repertoire normally considered
appropriate for a company of our size. A score of immense size and sophistication, Otello calls for three
extraordinary leading performers, a huge choral component, and Verdi's biggest orchestra.
Verdi hits us with that orchestra the instant the curtain rises. The opera opens with a cataclysmic
thunderstorm. It is, in the words of author Garry Wills, as if the whole universe were cracking open ... The
screaming sense of doom resembles the "Dies Irae" of Verdi's Requiem. An organ rumbles throughout ...
piccolos dash out lightning streaks, horns howl like the wind ...Harmonic slides make it seem as if the very
frame of the universe were dissolving ... Great choral expressions of terror wash over each other like sheets of
driving rain. The organ's continued roar gives an ominous undertow.
It's no surprise that Otello, like other operas we've done, demands orchestral forces too large to fit into the
Royal Theatre. That is why we use orchestral reductions. That is how POV audiences have been able to see
operas such as Richard Strauss' Daphne and Capriccio (rescored by Timothy) and last season's production of
Wagner's Das Rheingold (in a reduction by Alfons Abbass).

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 12
Timothy is now reworking the Otello score for our production. Fortunately, Verdi doubled many of the parts,
so the reduction (from four trumpets to three, from four bassoons to two, etc.) will be a matter more of size
than texture and richness.
As for the organ, we won't be trucking in a pipe organ anytime soon, but somehow the Victoria Symphony
will provide that disquieting, subterranean growl.
We are fortunate in our partners, the Victoria Symphony, whose players continue to join us in our operatic
outings, and we look forward to hearing them play this big romantic score with its depth of emotion, its
romantic sensuality, and its sonic thunderbolts.
Casting presents another of the great challenges of this opera.
Otello is notorious for being one of the most difficult roles in opera. It
demands a dramatic tenor with a heavy, heroic sound, strong top notes,
great stamina, and impressive acting ability. It is demanding physically,
vocally, and emotionally.
Timothy again: This is perhaps Verdi's most heroic writing for the tenor. It's
a long role and an intensely emotional one. Once Iago starts in on him,
Otello is basically in the grip of raw emotion through to the end. The singer
must maintain that growing tension and despair, that potential for violence
that is finally unleashed.
Iago too, he adds, is a big sing, and a fabulous acting role. It takes a real
actor to make this character more than one-dimensional. He must be
quicksilvery, smart, nimble, yet reveal darkness and hypocrisy.
Verdi (left) and Francesco
We have secured two international singers who know these roles well: Tamagno (right), the first Otello.
Kristian Benedikt, who sings Otello all over the world, and Todd Thomas, Photo taken c. 1899, signed by
who last season brought power and anguish to the role of Alberich in Das Verdi in 1900
Rheingold.
As for Desdemona, Timothy has watched Leslie Ann Bradley's beautiful performances for POV, most recently
as the Countess in The Marriage of Figaro, and believes she is ready to sing this great role for the first time.
Desdemona is innocence incarnate. The singer must convey warmth and purity, dignity, desolation, and
complete devotion to her husband. This is a great lyric soprano part that demands a beautiful voice.
Verdi himself searched in vain for a perfect Desdemona. He write to Ricordi shortly after the première,
Desdemona is a part in which the thread, the melodic line, never ceases from the first note to the last. Just as
Iago has only to declaim and laugh mockingly, and just as Otello, now the warrior, now the passionate lover,
now crushed to the point of baseness, now ferocious like a savage, must sing and shout, so Desdemona must
always, always sing.
She is, in essence, truth, beauty, pure song.
As we explore the truth and beauty and desolation of this opera, we are also extending the range and depth
of the art we're able to present, not only for our audience, but on the national scene as Otello joins a growing
number of POV co-productions.
Timothy explains, Like our recent productions of Falstaff and Das Rheingold, Otello is a step out beyond the
obvious for POV. Even though we don't have the big orchestra and theatre, we are always very respectful of
the artistic essence of the work. It demands that we be, if anything, more creative and inventive in finding
ways to bring it to the stage.
This is a production in which we stretch ourselves as a company – and that is always a good thing.
Maureen Woodall

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 13
The Composer: Giuseppe Verdi
1813 was a fine year for opera lovers as two giants of
the operatic world were born: the German Richard
Wagner and the Italian Giuseppe Verdi.
Giuseppe Verdi dominated Italian opera for half a
century with 28 operas that include some of the best
known in the repertoire, among them Nabucco,
Macbeth, Rigoletto, Il trovatore, La traviata, A Masked
Ball (Un Ballo in Maschera), Don Carlos, Aïda, Otello,
and Falstaff.
Verdi was not only a very popular and successful
composer, but an astute businessman and producer,
an active and committed farmer, a hero of the Italian
nationalist movement, a member of the first Italian
Parliament, and a generous philanthropist.
Verdi’s operas remain as popular today as when they
first appeared and form the core of today’s standard
Giuseppe Verdi repertoire. Many of the tunes from his operas are
familiar even to people who know nothing of opera.

Youth
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was born in October 1813 in the small village of Roncole, about 65
miles southeast of Milan in the province of Parma in Italy. At the time, Italy was made up of several small
states, most ruled by foreign powers. Parma was occupied by Napoleon's army, and Verdi's original birth
certificate is French, with his name registered as Joseph Fortunin François.
The area around Roncole was farming country. Verdi’s parents ran a tavern and a grocery store and leased
land and houses which they sublet to tenant farmers.
Young Verdi showed an early interest in music and was encouraged by his father, who bought an old spinet
piano and sent him to the church organist for lessons. Soon Giuseppe was substituting as organist at the
town church.
He was also an altar boy. Once when he was about seven, his attention wandered during Mass, and the priest
knocked him down. The child responded by cursing the priest, May God strike you with lightning. Eight years
later, the priest was killed when lightning struck a nearby church, killing four priests, two laymen, and two
dogs. Verdi delighted in retelling this story. Perhaps it shaped his fascination with the power of Monterone’s
curse in Rigoletto, an opera that Verdi originally titled La Maledizione (The Curse).
When Verdi was ten, his father sent him to the nearby city of Busseto for further musical training. He stayed
in the home of Antonio Barezzi, a local merchant and music enthusiast and gave singing and piano lessons to
Barezzi's daughter Margherita, whom he would later marry.
He also studied composition with Ferdinando Provesi, the local organist, choirmaster, teacher at the music
school, and leader of the amateur Philharmonic Society orchestra. Verdi became Provesi's protégé and
assistant, playing organ, composing, arranging and copying music and conducting rehearsals.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 14
At the age of 18, with financial support from Barezzi, Verdi went to Milan to apply to the Conservatory.
Although Milan is now part of Italy, at the time, it was under Austrian occupation, and a passport was needed
for travel between Busseto and Milan. Although he was rejected by the Conservatory, Verdi stayed in Milan
to study counterpoint with Vincenzo Lavigna, an opera composer who had played for many years at La Scala,
Milan’s renowned opera house.
In 1836, having returned to Busseto, Verdi married Margherita
Barezzi, accepted the position of maestro of the Busetto
Philharmonic, and composed his first opera, Rocester, which he later
renamed Oberto, conte di San Bonifacio.
The Verdis’ daughter Virginia was born in 1837, but died the following
year. In 1839 Giuseppe and Margherita moved back to Milan with
their little son, Icilio Romano, who died shortly after.
Verdi had tried without success to have Oberto performed in either
Parma or Milan, but in 1839, thanks to the recommendation of the
soprano Giuseppina Strepponi, Bartolomeo Merelli, the impresario at
La Scala, finally agreed to present Oberto. The opera was successful
enough to persuade Merelli to offer Verdi a contract to write more
operas.
While Verdi was working on his next opera, a comedy called Un
Giorno di Regno, his wife died.
Margherita Barezzi. first wife of
The deaths of his entire young family within such a short time left him Giuseppe Verdi. Copy of a painting by
devastated. Although he completed Un Giorno di Regno, it was a Augusto Mussini.
failure, and Verdi resolved never to compose again.

Early operas
It took two years for Merelli to persuade Verdi to compose another opera. The biblical story of the Israelites’
captivity in Babylon eventually captured Verdi’s imagination, and in 1842 Nabucco made its triumphant
première with Giuseppina Strepponi in the lead role of Abigaille.
Verdi became a celebrity overnight, not least because the Italian audience identified with the Israelites,
another people who were subjugated by foreign powers. The opera’s Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves, Va
pensiero, was sung in the streets of Milan and became an unofficial Italian national anthem.
Verdi was suddenly an inspirational figure in the Risorgimento, the movement toward a free, united Italy.
He was also now in demand as an opera composer and began what he called his years as a galley slave,
cranking out opera after opera, feeding the insatiable operatic appetites of theatres and audiences
throughout Italy and in Paris and London. Between 1843 and 1850 he composed and often directed
productions of 13 new operas, including Ernani, Macbeth, and Luisa Miller.
By 1850, Verdi was the leading composer of opera in Italy and one of the most successful in all of Europe.
His works, tuneful, highly dramatic, often with political overtones, captivated audiences. They also brought
prosperity to Verdi, to his Italian publisher Giovanni Ricordi, (and to succeeding generations of the Ricordi
family, including son Tito and grandson Giulio) and to numerous impresarios and agents.
During this time Verdi had kept in touch with Giuseppina Strepponi, the soprano who had recommended his
first opera and starred in his second. By 1846, ill health had forced Strepponi to retire from singing. She and
Verdi began working closely together in Paris in 1847, and Strepponi, with her inside knowledge of the
theatrical and musical world, became Verdi’s devoted and able collaborator.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 15
Over the next 50 years, until her death in 1897, Strepponi helped Verdi in business and musical matters and
handled negotiations and disputes with agents, impresarios, censors, and colleagues.
Strepponi also became Verdi’s mistress. This relationship caused a scandal
among Verdi’s family and friends, who were appalled by her reputation – she
had several illegitimate children – and by the fact that she and Verdi lived
openly together for several years before finally marrying in 1859.
The high point of Verdi’s “galley years” came with his “big three” –
“RigTrovTrav”, the three operas that are his most popular. Rigoletto premiered
in 1851 in Venice; Il trovatore was launched in Rome in 1853, followed six
weeks later by La traviata in Venice. While both Rigoletto and Il trovatore were
immediate hits, La traviata was at first less of a success.
Verdi called the premiere of La traviata a fiasco; it wasn’t actually an abject
failure – it did well enough at the box office, and Verdi had to take several bows
Giuseppina Strepponi, 1835 during Act 1. But he was disappointed that censors had insisted on
unceremoniously forcing his cutting-edge contemporary work to time-travel a
century and a half into the past.
He was also none too pleased with the singers. The soprano, Fanny Salvini-Donatelli, sang well, but was
plump enough to elicit laughter as she portrayed a frail consumptive in Act 3. The tenor, Lodovico Graziani,
went hoarse in the second act, and the baritone, Felice Varesi, put little heart into his performance, grumpily
complaining about both the subject matter (the main character is a kept woman or rather a common whore)
and the smallness of his own role (as the first Rigoletto and the first Macbeth, he felt that Germont was a
step down).

Dealing with Censorship

Despite Verdi’s popularity and the rapidity with which he churned out hit after hit, writing and producing the
operas was anything but a smooth process. In particular, Verdi had constant battles with censors.
Each opera was commissioned for a particular opera house, and each libretto had to be approved by the
appropriate authorities, who, given Italy’s fractured state, varied from city to city, and could include church
authorities as well as Austrian and French officials. Opera was a popular and prominent entertainment, and
censors were at pains to make sure that operas were morally and politically inoffensive. What would satisfy
the censors in one jurisdiction would not pass in another.
Both Rigoletto and La traviata premiered at the Teatro La Fenice, which was in Austrian-controlled Venice.
(Austria ruled much of northern Italy during the mid-19th century).
A libretto in Venice required approval from the theatre management, the mayor of the city, and the Austrian
Department of Public Order.
The opening of Rigoletto had to be delayed while Verdi and his librettist, Francesco Maria Piave, battled with
the Venetian censors. The play on which Rigoletto had been based, Le roi s'amuse (The King Amuses Himself)
by Victor Hugo, had opened in Paris two decades previously, in 1832, played for one night, and been
promptly banned as obscene and politically subversive.
The play was based on the life of the French King Francis I, who had been safely dead since 1547. However,
Hugo’s King Francis was a little too much like the current King, Louis-Phillipe, who had survived an
assassination attempt just before the play opened. The censors were not amused and shut the play down.
Despite a lawsuit by the furious playwright, the ban on performances remained in place for fifty years, even
though the printed version of the play was available. It was not until November 22, 1882, that Le roi s’amuse
could finally be seen again in Paris – a quarter century after Verdi’s Rigoletto first played Paris.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 16
Rigoletto was finally staged once Verdi and Piave moved the action from France to Mantua and changed the
title from to La Maledizione (The Curse) to Rigoletto (these changes were much more minor than some that
had been proposed, including getting rid of Rigoletto’s hump and the sack in which Gilda’s body was placed).
La traviata too had to be altered to please the censors. Fresh from the epic battle with the Venetian censors
over Rigoletto, Verdi and Piave could not have been surprised
that their sympathetic portrayal of a prostitute would again
raise hackles. Verdi managed to get La traviata approved, but
only after the setting was moved back 150 years to the Paris of
Louis XIV, thus avoiding the uncomfortable realities of Verdi’s
contemporary setting. The censors wanted it safely dated in
the past. They also insisted that Verdi change his title from
Amore e Morte – Love and Death – to the more judgemental
La traviata, meaning The Woman Who Strayed or The Fallen
Woman.
In the case of Verdi’s 1859 opera Un ballo in maschera (A
Masked Ball), no compromise could be reached with the
censors in Naples.
The opera’s plot was based on the 1789 assassination of the
Swedish King Gustavus III in Stockholm. In the face of the
censors’ adamant refusal to allow the assassination of a king to
be shown on stage, Verdi withdrew the opera and offered it to
Rome.
The papal censor was satisfied once Verdi had changed the Above: Verdi (right) with the Neapolitan
censor of A Masked Ball. Caricature by
setting to 17th-century Boston and transformed the King of
Melchiorre Delfico, 1859
Sweden into the Count of Warwick.

Italian Politics
Given the times and Italy’s political situation, the inflexibility of the Austrian censors in Naples was
understandable. There had been an attempt on the life of Napoleon III in Paris in 1858, and an opera on the
assassination of a ruler might give the populace ideas. Revolt was in the air. The Risorgimento, the movement
to unite Italy, was in full swing, and war between the nationalists and Austria was imminent.
Verdi himself was a popular figure among the nationalists. Not only did his operas appeal to patriots, but his
very name was an acronym for the revolution. The slogan Viva VERDI became code for Vittorio Emanuele, Re
D’Italia (Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy).
Victor Emmanuel was the king of Piedmont and a prime candidate to be leader of a united Italy. Piedmont,
which had remained independent of Austria during the 19th century, allied with France and went to war
against Austria in 1859, conquering some, but not all the provinces of Italy. Over the next decade, in a series
of campaigns, bits and pieces were added on to Italy, but as early as 1861, unification was sufficiently
underway that the first Italian parliament was established. Verdi himself was elected to this parliament, and
Victor Emmanuel was proclaimed King of Italy.
In 1866, when Italian government forces allied with Prussia against Austria to conquer the last remaining
territories under Austrian control, Verdi contributed money and guns for the troops. In 1874, King Victor
Emmanuel decreed him a lifetime Senator. Truth be told, Verdi was not a particularly active statesman. He
showed up at the Senate to take his oath and worked on getting government subsidies for the theatre.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 17
The Later Operas
During these intensely political times, Verdi was also intensely creative; between 1851 and 1871 he wrote
some of his greatest operas, beginning with the “RigTrovTrav” big three, along with Simon Boccanegra
(1857), Un ballo in maschera ( 1859), La forza del destino ( 1862), and Don Carlos (1867), and culminating
with the spectacular Aïda (1871), the grandest of grand operas, notorious for being the Opera With
Elephants.
As part of the celebrations surrounding the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, the Khedive (a Turkish Viceroy
who ruled Egypt) Ismail Pasha built a new opera house in Cairo. The inaugural performance in the opera
house was Verdi's Rigoletto. The Khedive also commissioned Verdi to write an opera with an Egyptian theme
specifically for the new Cairo Opera House. This was to be Aïda, which premiered spectacularly in 1871 and
has dazzled the world ever since.
At the premiere, there were 300 people on stage, and the audience of dignitaries and Egyptophiles included
the Khedive and his harem. The conductor was Giovanni Bottesini, also a composer and a double bass
virtuoso. In his enthusiasm for the opera, Bottesini went beyond the call of duty and financed a menagerie of
animals for the Triumphal March in the second act, including 12 elephants, 15 camels, and assorted zebras,
giraffes, lions, ostriches, jackals, baboons, and rodents. Only the elephants and camels were trained well
enough to perform; the other animals died of neglect, apparently because Bottesini forgot about them.
After the success of Aïda, Verdi decided to retire from writing operas. He was already well off, and his fee and
royalties for Aïda made him quite wealthy. At the age of 58, he was happy to devote himself to his farm in
Sant'Agata while occasionally composing or revising and producing some of his earlier works.
Verdi had bought the farm at Sant’Agata in 1848 and moved there with Strepponi in 1851. Over the years it
had been a sanctuary and a workplace, not only for composing, but for farming. He remodeled the house and
expanded the farm, participating actively in the farm work along with his tenant farmers.
Although Verdi is best known as an opera composer, he did write other music, most notably the monumental
Requiem of 1874. After the death of the eminent opera composer Gioacchino Rossini in 1868, Verdi had
proposed that Italian composers each contribute a section to a Requiem Mass in Rossini’s honour. This was
done, but the complete mass was not performed during Verdi’s lifetime. Several years later, in 1873,
Alessandro Manzoni, an Italian novelist and poet, died, and Verdi decided to use his Libera me as the starting
point for a Requiem Mass honouring Manzoni. Verdi’s complete Requiem was performed at the cathedral in
Milan, on the first anniversary of Manzoni’s death.
Some critics charged that the Requiem was too operatic and not sacred enough. The German conductor and
composer Hans von Bülow called it Verdi's latest opera, though in ecclesiastical robes. But composer
Johannes Brahms called it a work of genius. Certainly it is a stunningly dramatic, profoundly emotional work;
in particular the section called Dies Irae (Day of Wrath) captures the horror and terror of Judgement Day.

Verdi’s Final Years

Sixteen years after his “retirement”, the 74-year-old Verdi premiered his next opera, Otello, based on
Shakespeare’s play. Verdi had a profound admiration for Shakespeare, and his publisher Giulio Ricordi and
composer-poet Arrigo Boito, with Giuseppina Strepponi’s support, were able to persuade Verdi to take on
this project.
Otello was followed by another opera inspired by Shakespeare, the comedy Falstaff, which had its
triumphant première at La Scala in 1893, when Verdi was approaching 80. Falstaff was the first comic opera
Verdi had written since Un giorno di regno, more than 50 years earlier. At the end of his career, the master of
tragic opera created in Falstaff what has been called the greatest comic opera in the Italian repertoire.
Verdi also worked during his so-called retirement on philanthropic projects, founding a hospital and
establishing the Casa di Riposo, a home for retired musicians in Milan. Verdi purchased land for the Casa di
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 18
Riposo in 1889 and began construction of the house in 1896. He saw the Casa di Riposo as a way to provide
for musicians less fortunate than himself. In his will, Verdi left the building and grounds and all the royalties
from his compositions to the Casa di Riposo, which still exists, serving as a home for singers, dancers, and
other musicians, as well as visiting music students.
Giuseppina died in 1897. Verdi then lived at the Grand Hotel in Milan, finding companionship with retired
soprano Teresa Stolz, whom he had known for some 30 years. Rumours were that they had long been lovers;
Stolz had also performed much of Verdi’s music and sang Aïda in the 1872 Milan premiere.
Verdi suffered a stroke on January 21, 1901 and died six days later. He was buried in Milan at the Casa di
Riposo. His funeral was a national event, and thousands lined the streets, singing Va, pensiero, the famous
chorus from Nabucco. Among the mourners were such great composers as Rossini, Donizetti, and Puccini.

1898. In the garden of Verdi’s villa in

Sant’Agata.
From left, seated: Verdi’s cousin, Maria
Carrara Verdi, whom he had adopted
as his daughter; Verdi’s sister-in-law,
Barberina Strepponi; Giuseppe Verdi;
Giulio Ricordi’s wife Giuditta.
From left, standing: singer Teresa
Stolz; lawyer Umberto Campanari;
Verdi’s publisher, Giulio Ricordi; artist
Leopoldo Metlicovitz.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 19
The Librettist: Arrigo Boito
When the greatest composer-librettist teams in opera are mentioned,
three partnerships are usually the first to come to mind: Wolfgang
Amadeus Mozart and Lorenzo Da Ponte; Richard Strauss and Hugo von
Hofmannsthal; and Giuseppe Verdi and Arrigo Boito.

Verdi and Boito completed only two operas together – Otello and Falstaff,
the last two operas of Verdi’s career. Yet those two operas were enough to
vault their collaboration to the top tier of composer-librettist
collaborations.

Born in 1842, Boito was nearly 30 years Verdi’s junior. Although he was a
composer, with one finished opera, Mefistofele, to his credit, Boito is best
known today as a poet and as a librettist, most notably for Amilcare
Ponchielli’s La Gioconda and for the two Verdi masterpieces.

Verdi and Boito first worked together in 1862 when Boito wrote the text of
Verdi’s cantata Inno delle nazioni (Hymn of the Nations). Shortly after, however, Boito managed to offend
Verdi, to the point where the two were estranged for many years. Boito was among a group of young
intellectuals called Scapigliati (roughly “slobs” or “dishevelled ones,” the Italian equivalent to the French
bohème) who saw German art and Wagner as the wave of the future and thought Italian opera was
backward and old-fashioned. In 1863, Boito wrote an ode after the première of an opera by Franco Faccio,
one of the Scapigliati. In it he hailed Faccio as the composer fated “to cleanse the altar of Italian opera of the
stains that now defile it like a brothel wall.” Not surprisingly, Verdi, the chief face of Italian opera, took
offence.

Boito and Verdi were eventually reconciled and in 1881, perhaps as a trial run for a full-fledged collaboration,
Verdi’s publisher Ricordi persuaded Verdi to allow Boito to revise the libretto of Simon Boccanegra. Verdi was
won over, and the two went on to develop a close partnership and a friendship which lasted until Verdi’s
death.

Knowing they shared a deep admiration for Shakespeare, Boito initiated the process of composition for each
of the twin miracles of Verdi's old age, Otello and Falstaff. It was his brilliance in reducing, adapting and
reforming the characters and situations of the Shakespearean plays that convinced Verdi that he could return
to the compositional table. It was his encouragement that persuaded the old man to undertake the greatest
artistic risk of his life, to write a comedy, almost devoid of arias, in a style that defied all traditional
expectations of Italian opera. Verdi was at last able to write for himself. The results were exhilarating.
(Iain Scott, Arias Magazine, 2003)

My great wish … is to have you set to music a libretto that I have written solely for the joy of seeing you take
up your pen once more through my efforts, for the glory of being your collaborator, for the ambition of
hearing my name coupled with yours, and ours with Shakespeare's … Only you can compose Otello ... it is
predestined for you.
Boito to Verdi, April 1884

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 20
Links and Resources

Othello / Otello
http://www.pov.bc.ca/otello.html Pacific Opera Victoria's web pages on Otello: videos, artist bios, musical
selections, and more.
http://www.pov.bc.ca/pdfs/otello_newsletter.pdf Pacific Opera Victoria’s Newsletter: A shorter version of
From Othello to Otello, plus an introduction to the artists and information on this co-production with Opéra
de Montréal.
http://www.murashev.com/opera/Otello_libretto_English_Italian Libretto of the Opera in Italian and English
http://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/Library/Texts/Oth/ Shakespeare’s Play: Internet Shakespeare editions
has texts and facsimiles of the play, along with commentary and extensive resources
http://imslp.org/wiki/Otello_%28Verdi,_Giuseppe%29 Vocal Score of the opera
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otello Wikipedia article on the opera includes its composition history, a
synopsis, and musical analysis.
http://www.classicalnotes.net/opera/otello.html Peter Gutmann on Otello: Overview of the opera, its
creation and music, as well as a survey of early recordings of the opera. Gutmann is a lawyer and journalist,
writer for Goldmine magazine, creator of Classicalnotes.net, a layman and “deeply devoted fan” and
advocate for classical music.
http://www.classical.net/~music/comp.lst/works/verdi/otello/index.php Overview of Otello: Synopsis,
performance history, famous interpreters, and more.

Historic Context
The Moors
What the opera tells us about Otello’s background is sketchy: he is a
Moor, who grew up in the burning sands of the desert, escaped
slavery, became a warrier and is now the Governor of Cyprus,
reporting to the Venetian government.
The Moors were originally a nomadic people of northern Africa. The
word was first used to describe the natives of Mauretania – the region
of North Africa today known as Morocco and Algeria – and was also
applied to people of Arab and Berber origin who conquered and ruled
the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal) from 711 to 1492. The
Berbers inhabited the coastal region of North Africa bounded by
Egypt, the Atlantic, the Sahara, and the Mediterranean Sea, an area
that today comprises Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya.
The term Moor usually refers to a Muslim and so conjures up
thoughts of the Arabian Nights, the Crusades, of centuries of conflict Above: Abd el-Ouahed ben Messaoud
between the Christian and Islamic worlds, and of the intricate Moorish ben Mohammed, Moorish Ambassador
architecture of Spain. to Queen Elizabeth I. Reproduction of
an Elizabethan painting, artist unknown.
In 1600, about three years before Shakespeare wrote Othello, a The painting belongs to the collection of
Moorish ambassador from the Barbary state of Morocco arrived at the the University of Birmingham.
court of Queen Elizabeth I to negotiate a military alliance against
Spain. It has been suggested that this ambassador, Abd el-Ouahed ben Messaoud ben Mohammed Anoun,
may have inspired the character of Shakespeare’s Moorish hero Othello.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 21
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abd_el-Ouahed_ben_Messaoud Wikipedia article on Abd el-Ouahed ben
Messaoud ben Mohammed Anoun, the Moorish Ambassador who visited London in 1600.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moors Wikipedia article on Moors: Moors are not a distinct or self-defined people.
This article provides an overview of the Moorish people from the perspective of history, etymology, and art.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_Xnc8ijkrA When the
Moors Ruled in Europe (Video). This fascinating
documentary, narrated by historian Bettany Hughes, explores
the sophisticated culture of the Moors in Europe during the
nearly 800 years in which they occupied Al-Andalus (the
Iberian Peninsula).
th
Dr. Hughes discusses the birth of Islam in 7 century Saudi
Arabia, its spread, and the resultant flourishing of Moorish
literature, art, architecture, science, technology, and
agriculture in Medieval Europe. She shows us the
breathtaking architecture and mathematical ingenuity of the Alhambra; recounts the arrival of Arabic numerals in
Europe; and explores the critical role that Islamic culture played in the growth of Western thought and the
foundation of the Renaissance.
This is a thought-provoking, visually arresting look at an aspect of history that most of us don’t know. The story,
says Bettany Hughes, isn’t a simple tale of good versus bad, east versus west. It’s intriguing and complicated, it’s
brilliant and brutal, it’s very human, and it’s very messy, and it’s for precisely that reason that it needs to be
remembered, not written out of the history books.

Venice and Cyprus

The opera Otello and all but the first act of Shakespeare’s play Othello are set in a port city on the
Mediterranean Island of Cyprus at a time when the island was ruled by the Venetian Republic.
Venice was a city-state at the head of the Adriatic Sea in what is now Northern Italy. Beginning about AD
1000, Venice began amassing an empire; it gained control of the sea route to the Holy Land during the
Crusades and eventually dominated trade in the Mediterranean. Among its acquisitions was the Island of
Cyprus, which it ruled from 1489 until 1571 when the Ottoman Turks finally conquered it.
Shakespeare wrote Othello around 1603, some 30 years after the Ottoman Empire defeated the Venetians
and took over Cyprus. He and his audience therefore knew that the naval victory over the Turks mentioned in
the play was short-lived – an awareness that may have lent a layer of irony to the play and the notion of the
triumphant Venetians.
That great naval victory mentioned in the play was probably the 1571 Battle of Lepanto. In 1570 the Ottoman
Turks had attacked Cyprus and taken most of the island, save for the heavily fortified city of Famagusta (the
port city that is the likely setting of both play and opera). After a 10-month siege, Famagusta too fell, but in
October 1571, an alliance of European powers decisively destroyed the Turkish fleet in a battle off the
southwestern coast of Greece at Lepanto (now known as Nafpaktos).
Bickering among the Christian nations prevented them from capitalizing on their triumph, and Cyprus actually
remained in Turkish hands. However, the Ottoman Turks were now confined to the eastern Mediterranean,
their threat against western Europe essentially neutralized.
The victory at Lepanto heralded the end of Turkish supremacy in the Mediterranean and was celebrated
throughout Christian Europe, by Catholics and Protestants alike. It was memorialized in art and literature. In
fact, King James VI of Scotland, who succeeded Elizabeth in 1603 as King James I of England, had, in his youth,
written a heroic poem called Lepanto – which was republished when James came to the throne.
Shakespeare surely welcomed the opportunity to make an oblique reference to Lepanto in the play he was
writing at the time – as a way to curry a little favour with the new King.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 22
http://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/A04258.0001.001/1:4?rgn=div1;view=fulltext His Maiesties Lepanto, or
heroicall song being part of his poeticall exercises at vacant houres. Text of the heroic poem written by King
James (James VI of Scotland, James I of England) to celebrate the Battle of Lepanto.
http://www.cypnet.co.uk/ncyprus/history/venetian/index.html
History of the Venetian period in Cyprus
Cyprus is an Island in the eastern Mediterranean, on the intersection
of three continents: Europe, Asia and Africa. Syria and Lebanon are
100 km to its east; 75 km to the north is Turkey, and 380 km to the
south is Egypt.
Sitting as it does on the border of the Eastern and Western worlds, it
is not surprising that since ancient times, Cyprus has been colonized
and conquered by many outside forces: Assyrians, Phoenicians,
Persians, Greeks, Egyptians, Romans and Byzantines; England’s
Richard the Lionheart, who sold the island to the Knights Templar
(1191-1192), the Franks (Lusignans) (1192-1489), the Venetians (1489-
1571), the Ottomans (1571-1878); and the British (1878 -1960).
In 1970 the Island theoretically gained independence, only to be
embroiled in conflict between Turkish and Greek claims. The United
Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP), one of the longest-
running UN Peacekeeping missions, was set up in 1964 to prevent
further fighting between the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot
communities on the island. UNFICYP’s responsibilities expanded in
1974, following a coup by elements favouring union with Greece and a
subsequent military intervention by Turkey, whose troops established
control over the northern part of the island. UNFICYP has supervised
the ceasefire lines; provided humanitarian assistance; and maintained Othello Castle in Famagusta, Cyprus.
a buffer zone between the Turkish and Turkish Cypriot forces in the Note the stone relief of the winged
Lion of St Mark, the symbol of Venice,
north and the Greek Cypriot forces in the south.
on the wall.
The opera, like most of the play, is set in a port city in Cyprus,
presumably Famagusta, which was the last part of Cyprus to fall to the Turks, in 1571.
http://www.whatson-northcyprus.com/interest/famagusta/famagusta/walls.htm
Explore the city walls and some of the sights of Famagusta.
http://www.whatson-northcyprus.com/interest/famagusta/famagusta/othello.htm
There is actually a citadel in Famagusta, known as Othello Castle or Othello’s Tower. It was built in the 14th
century and fortified by the Venetians when they took over Cyprus.

At right: detail of the winged Lion of

St Mark, the symbol of Venice on the
walls of Othello Castle in Famagusta.
The front paws are on land,
representing Venice's land power; the
rear paws are in the sea, representing
her maritime empire.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 23
Study Activities

Exploring Plot and Character

Create a character sketch for one of the characters in Otello (for example, Iago, Emilia, Otello, Cassio, etc.).
Questions you might ask about the character include:
What are we told about this character?
Read the synopsis or the libretto (http://www.murashev.com/opera/Otello_libretto_English_Italian)
for clues.
What else do we know about this character? (What do the character’s actions and words tell us?)
What is the character’s relationship with the other characters?
Why does the character make the choices he or she does?
Include evidence from the opera to support your claim. Keep in mind the music sung by your character. Do
the emotions conveyed through the music fit the character sketches?
Create a journal or a Facebook page for your character. Write about the events of the opera from that
character’s point of view. Write in the first person, and include only information that the character would
know.
After seeing the opera, look at your character sketch again. Does any aspect of the performance or the
music you heard change your view of the character you have profiled? Why?
Do the emotions conveyed through the music fit the character sketch?

After the Opera

Draw a picture of your favourite scene in the opera.
What is happening in this scene?
What characters are depicted?

Create an opera design.

Design and draw a stage set for a scene in Otello.
Design and draw costumes for the characters in the scene.

Write a review of the opera.

What did you think about the sets, props and costumes?
Would you have done something differently? Why?
What were you expecting? Did it live up to your expectations?
Talk about the singers. Describe their characters. Describe their voices.
Who was your favourite character?
What was your favourite visual moment in the opera?
What was your favourite musical moment in the opera?

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Pacific Opera Victoria Study Guide for Otello 2015 24