In this third edition of the classic Verdi, renowned authority Julian Budden offers a comprehensive overview of Verdi the man and the artist, tracing his ascent from humble beginnings to the status of a cultural patriarch of the new Italy, whose cause he had done much to promote, and demonstrating the gradual enlargement over the years of his artistic vision. This concise study is an accessible, insightful, and engaging summation of Verdi scholarship, acquainting the non-specialist with the personal details Verdi's life, with the operatic world in which he worked, and with his political ideas, his intellectual vision, and his powerful means of communicating them through his music.
In his survey of the music itself, Budden emphasizes the unique character of each work as well as the developing sophistication of Verdi's style.
He covers all of the operas, the late religious works, the songs, and the string quartet. A glossary explains even the most obscure operatic terms current in Verdi's time.
Preface Illustrations Key to sigla 1: Early life at Busseto 2: Success and failure in Milan 3: The journeyman 4: Florence, London and Paris 5: Return to Busseto 6: Viva V.E.R.D.I. 7: The new order 8: The dark decade 9: ndian summer 10: The last years 11: Verdi as man and artist 12: The Music 13: The background 14: From Oberto to Ernani 15: The prison years 16: The high noon 17: Towards grand opera 18: The final masterpieces 19: Miscellaneous operatic compositions 20: Chamber compositions 21: Choral and religious works Appendices A: Calendar B: List of works C: Personalia D: Select bibiliograph E: Glossary of nineteenth-century operatic terms Index
