Is 'Falstaff' Verdi's Greatest Opera ?

[marvinbrown]

Hi ladies and gents,

First, let me say hello as this is my first post here on GMG.

My adoration and love for Verdi's Falstaff knows no bounds. I just never tire of listening to it... Musically, it brings me such intense and endless delight. In my judgment it is his finest opera and his magnum opus. Does anyone here agree ?

Cheers,

Operahaven   

  As much as I love Flastaff I find Otello and Aida far greater than Flastaff. 

  marvin

[head-case]

No

[Haffner]

Verdi's  Falstaff  is one of the gems of Western culture and truly is a connoisseur's opera...

Yes, but Rigolletto and La Traviata just seem ta do it for me the most. Those two made Verdi my idol, and in my opinion by far the greatest composer of Italian Opera ever.

[karlhenning]

  As much as I love Flastaff I find Otello and Aida far greater than Flastaff. 

"Far greater"?

[BachQ]

I find Otello and Aida far greater than Flastaff. 

Explain.


























(2,000 word limit)

[Haffner]

Explain.




I'm curious as well. Seriously.























(2,000 word limit)

[BachQ]

I'm curious as well. Seriously.

Are you implying that, perhaps, my curiosity is less than purely genuine?

[(poco) Sforzando]

Yes, but Rigolletto and La Traviata just seem ta do it for me the most. Those two made Verdi my idol, and in my opinion by far the greatest composer of Italian Opera ever.

Stravinsky's favorite Verdi operas were also Rigolletto and Flastaff.

[Haffner]

Are you implying that, perhaps, my curiosity is less than purely genuine?

(laughing) no...seriously    .

[marvinbrown]

Explain.

  I write the following  without prejudice and GMG members are free to disagree with me:

  Otello is a remarkable masterpeice.  I believe that Verdi was able to express, musically, the dramatic elements of Shakespeare's Otello far more effectively than the comedic elements of Falstaff.  Granted Falstaff is a comedy and parallels between comedies and tragedies are often difficult to make, if not unfair to make.  But what can I say Otello is simply a better opera whichever way you look at it.

  With regards to Aida, well this opera is pure magic. The music draws you into that mythical world of ancient Egypt- I do not even need to watch the opera to be transported into that wonderful ancient world. Verdi's music does that so well I can not say the same about Falstaff.  Falstaff simply can not compete with Aida in that regard- or any other regard for that matter  ! 

     


























(2,000 word limit)

[Mark G. Simon]

Stravinsky's favorite Verdi operas were also Rigolletto and Flastaff.

I suppose he might have had a change of heart, but in the Poetics of Music he says "How can we help regretting that this master of the traditional opera, at the end of a long life studded with so many authentic masterpieces, climaxed his career with Falstaff, which if it is not Wagner's best work, is not Verdi's best opera either?"

and he continues: "I know I am going counter to the general opinion that sees Verdi's best work in the deterioration of the genius that gave us Rigoletto, Il Trovatore, Aida and La Traviata. I know I am defending precisely what the elite of the recent past belittled in works of this great composers. I regret having to say so; but I maintain there is more substance and true invention in "La donna è mobile", for example, in which this elite saw nothing but deplorable facility, than in the rhetoric and vociferations of the Ring."

[marvinbrown]

I suppose he might have had a change of heart, but in the Poetics of Music he says "How can we help regretting that this master of the traditional opera, at the end of a long life studded with so many authentic masterpieces, climaxed his career with Falstaff, which if it is not Wagner's best work, is not Verdi's best opera either?"

and he continues: "I know I am going counter to the general opinion that sees Verdi's best work in the deterioration of the genius that gave us Rigoletto, Il Trovatore, Aida and La Traviata. I know I am defending precisely what the elite of the recent past belittled in works of this great composers. I regret having to say so; but I maintain there is more substance and true invention in "La donna è mobile", for example, in which this elite saw nothing but deplorable facility, than in the rhetoric and vociferations of the Ring."

  I was not aware of this quote from Stravinsky but now that I am I find his anti-Wagnerian sentiments deplorable!  On the other hand I do agree with him that Falstaff is not Verdi's best opera.

  marvin

[karlhenning]

Flastaff

I thought this was an alternate title, from the Arizona location, for Puccini's La fanciulla del West?

[karlhenning]

  I was not aware of this quote from Stravinsky but now that I am I find his anti-Wagnerian sentiments deplorable!

Marvin, lighten up!  The Wagner PR machine was in full swing for long decades;  so anti-Wagnerian sentiment, far from being "deplorable," is actually a valid artistic impulse.

But if this is going to be the sticking-point for you viz. Stravinsky, I'll tell you plainly this day: Igor Fyodorovich delighted to call himself "the Anti-Wagner" 

[marvinbrown]

Marvin, lighten up!  The Wagner PR machine was in full swing for long decades;  so anti-Wagnerian sentiment, far from being "deplorable," is actually a valid artistic impulse.

But if this is going to be the sticking-point for you viz. Stravinsky, I'll tell you plainly this day: Igor Fyodorovich delighted to call himself "the Anti-Wagner" 

  Well then in that case can we argue that Falstaff is Verdi's most anti-wagnerian opera?  I ask this because Verdi was accused of becoming "Wagnerian" with Don Carlo.

  marvin

[Operahaven]

Marvin, lighten up!  The Wagner PR machine was in full swing for long decades;  so anti-Wagnerian sentiment, far from being "deplorable," is actually a valid artistic impulse.

But if this is going to be the sticking-point for you viz. Stravinsky, I'll tell you plainly this day: Igor Fyodorovich delighted to call himself "the Anti-Wagner" 

Karl,

What I never understood is why Stravinsky also takes a swipe at  Pelleas et Melisande...

[(poco) Sforzando]

I suppose he might have had a change of heart, but in the Poetics of Music he says "How can we help regretting that this master of the traditional opera, at the end of a long life studded with so many authentic masterpieces, climaxed his career with Falstaff, which if it is not Wagner's best work, is not Verdi's best opera either?"

and he continues: "I know I am going counter to the general opinion that sees Verdi's best work in the deterioration of the genius that gave us Rigoletto, Il Trovatore, Aida and La Traviata. I know I am defending precisely what the elite of the recent past belittled in works of this great composers. I regret having to say so; but I maintain there is more substance and true invention in "La donna è mobile", for example, in which this elite saw nothing but deplorable facility, than in the rhetoric and vociferations of the Ring."

We are both in a sense correct, but you are referring to the Stravinsky of the Poetics, and I was thinking of the older Stravinsky, who indeed have a change of heart as reported in his conversations with Robert Craft. From Conversations with Stravinsky (Garden City: Doubleday, 1959), p. 83:

Craft:  Do you still feel as you once did about late Verdi?

Stravinsky:  No.  In fact, I am struck by the force, especially in Falstaff, with which he resisted Wagnerism, resisted or kept away from what had seized the advanced musical world.  The presentation of musical monologues seems to me more original in Falstaff than in Otello.  Original also are the instrumentation, harmony, and voice leading, yet none of these has left any element of the sort that could create a school--so different is Verdi's originality from Wagner's.  Verdi's gift is pure, and even more remarkable than the gift itself is the strength with which he developed it from Rigoletto to Falstaff, to name the two operas I love best.

[karlhenning]

  Well then in that case can we argue that Falstaff is Verdi's most anti-wagnerian opera?

No, on the contrary.  Falstaff is less clearly separated into discrete numbers, and so is more nearly allied to Wagner's ideas of 'music drama'.

[(poco) Sforzando]

No, on the contrary.  Falstaff is less clearly separated into discrete numbers, and so is more nearly allied to Wagner's ideas of 'music drama'.

On the other hand, Verdi makes no use of the Leitmotiv, which permeates Wagner's textures with a fluid set of musical motifs that are used variously for purposes of characterization and reminiscence. Verdi does use certain recurring tag phrases in Falstaff - Dalla due alle tre, Povera donna! (a comic allusion to Traviata's Violetta), Caro buon Messer Ford, Bocca bacciata non perde ventura - but in a more static way than Wagner might have. To have truly been "Wagnerian," Verdi would have had to create Leitmotivs representing jealousy (Ford), obesity (Falstaff), young love (Fenton + Nanetta), dirty laundry, and the like. He did not. If anything, he tends to do the opposite - always creating new and highly individualized sections of music that are rarely if ever heard again during the course of the opera.

[Mark G. Simon]

  I was not aware of this quote from Stravinsky but now that I am I find his anti-Wagnerian sentiments deplorable! 

Stravinsky's attitude towards Wagner changed at various points in his life, just as his musical style did. As a young man he was quite a Wagner enthusiast. His 1906 song cycle Faun and Shepherdess concludes with a clear reference to Tristan. As late as 1911 he willingly went to Bayreuth to take in the Ring.

In a TV documentary made late in his life the camera discovers a portrait of Wagner hanging on a wall in his house and Stravinsky explains that when he was younger he hated Wagner, and for the right reasons, and now that he's old he loves Wagner, and also for the right reasons. He doesn't explain what the "right reasons" are.