Nabucco

At age 27, Verdi resolved to never write opera again. He was at a low point in his life, both professionally and personally: His comic opera, Un giorno di regno, had failed, and around the same time he had to bury his two young children, and then his wife. After some convincing by his agent, he read Solera’s libretto, Nabucco, and by spring of 1842, all of Milan was humming “Va, pensiero...” The central point of the opera stands at a historical crossroads: value systems are changing and life is coming under the control of interrelationships starkly contasting previously in place. In the crosshairs of this conflict between vanquisher and vanquished unfolds a family drama in which the music of the Italian master leads the listener through the entire range of possible emotions. The production lifts the story out of the biblical era and places it into the realm of the cosmic.