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Rating: I owe the discovery of Otello to Sergio Cofferati. Not that I have any particular fondness for him. Nor any particular dislike.
Many years ago, on Repubblica, maybe on the Friday edition, he was interviewed.
Those usual things, what do you like to eat, your favorite book. Answers that I don't remember.
The music you would like to have while making love. Otello.
The music you would like at your funeral. Otello.
Alright. I don’t have any particular liking or disliking for the former secretary of the Cgil. However, a declaration of love like that, for me, is bait. More than that.
Verdi composed Otello when he was already old. Already retired, one might say, even opening a parenthesis, one of those I adore, Cofferati, pensions. Close.
He had already had everything. He finished with Aida, a worldwide success. And a fantastic opera. He’s a parliamentarian in the young Italian State. And he tries to do it well too. Anyway, by now, he's at his age.
Then two things happen.
A young punk, Arrigo Boito, writes something. He writes: 'Giuseppe Verdi is a monument. I spit on monuments. I would tear them all down.'
Verdi does not respond.
A strange guy, named Richard Wagner, is starting to dominate the world. Writing operas that send people into ecstasy. Doing things that change the history of music.
One of these, maybe someone in here really likes, is called Tristan and Isolde.
And - inside Tristan and Isolde - the love scene. Which any book, any critic, will tell you is the beginning of everything that will come, musically, in the twentieth century. And perhaps beyond. It is a very long scene. Based on the contrast of light and shadow, on the meeting of two souls, on a thousand things. With references to philosophers, the prominent ones.
At 64 years old, Giuseppe Verdi calls Arrigo Boito and has him compose the libretto. He’ll handle the music. In the second act, he places a love scene.
It has very little to do with the story. And it is not even one of his most beautiful love scenes.
However, towards the end, Otello sings (I quote from memory):
Let death take me
in the ecstasy of this embrace
the supreme moment
Giuseppe Verdi, from Busseto, Otello, 1877.
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