On 2 June 2021, the OperaWednesday series presented the final work by Giuseppe Verdi. The highlights of his comic opera Falstaff were streamed from 8:00 p.m. on Facebook and Origo.hu.
A combined marvel of inexhaustible creative force, of the serene wisdom of advanced age and of artistic renewal. This is how the world has regarded Giuseppe Verdi’s final opera ever since its Milan premiere in 1893. “Shakespeare is my favourite writer. I have known his works from a young age, and I re-read them constantly,” the composer wrote in a letter. of Shakespeare – than is the playwright’s original comedy, The Merry Wives of Windsor. “Tutto nel mondo e burla,” sings the entire cast of the opera based on The Merry Wives of Windsor – both the jesters and their victims – in the masterful fugue that closes the comic opera. The message from a nearly 80-old Verdi rings true even today, in the bicentennial year of his birth: “All the world is a joke… we love to laugh at each other!”
The title role was performed by Alexandru Agache, his partners in the concert highlights were Zoltán Kelemen, Ninh Duc Hoang Long, János Szerekován, Donát Varga, Géza Gábor, Andrea Rost, Kinga Kriszta, Bernadett Wiedemann and Erika Gál accompanied by Kálmán Szennai (piano) and conducted by Balázs Kocsár. The performance was staged by Katalin Lázár and narrated by Dániel Mona.
The performance can be viewed HERE.
Photo by Valter Berecz