Often at the beginning of great success and great popularity is a failure. So it is with La traviata, Giuseppe Verdi's 18th opera, the last of the magnificent trio, which also includes Rigoletto and Troubadour. In the midst of his work on the Troubadour, in 1852, during a visit to Paris, the composer watched the play La Dame aux Camélias by Alexandre Dumas-son. The story of the rejected and beloved courtesan Violeta Valeri, the story of her personal tragedy and reproach for public meanness and cruelty is largely autobiographical for Dumas-son; Among the prototypes of the characters are the famous Parisian traviata (here I remind you that this is not a proper name, but a pejorative definition - a failed or wayward woman) Marie Duplessis, the author himself, having a relationship with her, probably Georges Germont bears something of Dumas -the father and his authoritarian behavior in the case of his son and Duplessis ... The play, originally a story, scandalized the society of that time with its "immoral" plot, with the very fact of putting a "tramp" in the spotlight. Thus Dumas violated the pact of discretion around the secret pleasures of the bourgeoisie, revealing their dark, tragic shadow. Verdi discovers a contemporary plot that he has been looking for for a long time, and another order arrives in time from Teatro La Fenice in Venice with a deadline for premiere in March 1853. Verdi and his librettist Francesco Maria Piave begin a hectic work in Santa Agata. As mentioned at the beginning, the premiere is scandalous. The reasons for this are various: the unsuitable for the role of tuberculous courtesan round and flowering diva Salvini-Donatelli, the unhappy Alfredo and the unsuitable Georges Germont; aversion to and shock from the "scandalous" scenario, the modern atmosphere and costumes. After its premiere and until the mid-1980s, the opera was placed in a historical environment, shifted back to the "time of Cardinal Richelieu", a fate that later befell the "Masked Ball", but no longer moral, but for political reasons. Verdi writes: The premiere was a complete failure. But whose fault is it - mine or the singers'? Time will tell.
Time clearly responds and makes its decisive adjustments in the evaluation of the new opera. The composer also made his corrections before the new production, a year later, again in Venice, this time at the Teatro San Benedetto: the place of the catastrophe became the place where the triumph began. Madrid, Barcelona, New York, London, Paris ... Although they do not stop, the indignation of the plot gradually subsides before the admiration for the music. And, as some contemporary critics point out: It is not clear why the "immorality" of "La Traviata" arouses such concern and how it is more frightening than what is happening on stage in "Don Juan", for example?
The story of Verdi's masterpiece is the story of Cinderella from a maid who became a princess. But here the miracle does not come from a sorceress; the miracle is in the score itself ...
author: Dragomir Yosifov
