Giuseppe Verdi
Il Trovatore

Placed there like that, between Rigoletto and La Traviata, Il Trovatore seems like a piece out of place. Indeed it is, but it is precisely the concept of "popular trilogy," just for understanding, with RigolettoTrovatoreTraviata grouped together as a singular phase in Verdi’s artistic journey, that is a critical imposition due more than anything to the enormous success of these three operas. Already between Rigoletto and Traviata, the similarities are rather weak and generic, but we can say that both introduce innovative elements, especially thematically, in the Verdi style. Il Trovatore fundamentally has little to nothing innovative. It is not an integral part of a new course but a culminating point, the last, sublime masterpiece of the so-called first Verdi, the Verdi of Nabucco, Ernani, Attila, and Macbeth, the most romantic, the most bel canto Verdi, who in the emotional emphasis of arias like those of Leonora, invariably crowned by voluptuous cabalettas, reached his highest peaks, capturing so effectively the popular sensitivity with choruses like "Vedi le fosche notturne spoglie". After Il Trovatore, this Verdi will gradually disappear and, even before for obvious reasons of evolution, after such a swan song it just couldn’t be otherwise.

I adore Il Trovatore for the same reasons I adore Macbeth, despite all the differences in the case, fundamentally the style and dramatic power remain the same, and not only: that narrative structure, with the current story and the backstory (the whole first scene, Tacea la notte placida, Stride la vampa, condotta ell’era in ceppi) that come to close simultaneously in the dramatic finale directly brings me to another of my personal totems, Mascagni’s Guglielmo Ratcliff. It’s a continuous succession of chills, chills and then more chills, here Verdi was truly on fire with inspiration, and not only in his classic arias: just consider that at the anvil chorus he immediately follows with "Stride la vampa", a juxtaposition that maximizes the contrast between the cohesive and supportive spirit of the community and the excruciating pain of the individual, creating a dramatic effect of incomparable efficiency and synthesis. But it is the whole scene, dominated by Azucena, THE dramatic mezzo-soprano role par excellence, that shines with immediate pathos and tragedy, up to the cathartic, memorable closure "Sul capo mio le chiome sento drizzarsi ancor, drizzarsi ancor..."

But not all of Il Trovatore is like this, on the contrary, its particular charm also lies in the fact that, despite being a dark-colored story, with characters sketched exceedingly clearly, it lavishly offers pages of ineffable, intoxicating, lyrical beauty, laden with spiritual tension, striving upwards in search of an unattainable ideal of happiness and bliss. Literally, you cannot count the moments when it feels like touching the sky; "L’onda dei suoni mistici", that love duet lasting exactly one minute, the only glimmer of authentic ecstasy granted to Manrico and Leonora by the relentless flow of events, the poignant play of contrasts in "Miserere d’un alma". More generally, all the solo moments are like this, "Tacea la notte placida", "Deserto sulla terra", "Ah si, ben mio", "D’amor sull’ali rosee", even those of the Count di Luna, "Tace la notte" and "Il balen del suo sorriso". Every moment when the characters interact with each other, every duet, every chorus, is instead ignited with passion, with electric and often belligerent dynamism; the narrative that opens the opera with a sumptuous chorus-solo bass duet, the duel scene, the confrontation between Leonora and the Count, the tragic final reckoning.

In the final analysis, Il Trovatore is fundamentally an epic swashbuckling drama, honest, not clouded by intrigues and subterfuges; Leonora is truly encapsulated in that "S’io non vivrò per esso, per esso morirò", Manrico in his dual nature of artist and warrior, Azucena in that blaze that never ceases to shriek for her, the Count in the bitterness of unrequited love. Yet here there is nothing trite, stylized, every single moment of music comes alive with that particular dramatic lyricism majestic yet stark, never self-indulgent, that only the best Verdi knew how to provide. The best Verdi who had, of course, also an immediacy of melodic writing so as to easily reach a vast audience; also for this reason Il Trovatore is one of those operas that everyone should know because it is one of those operas of such universal beauty that it transcends any genre and fashion barrier; rhetorical, certainly, but true.