Customer Reviews

Verdi: A Biography

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I have just finished reading this book. It was my intention to get the bits and pieces I have been taught over the years about Verdi together in order to teach a short course on him in January 2000. It has done so much more. If you're looking for a book that details the opera plots and offers translations of the librettos, this isn't it. But if you're looking for a great summary of what we know about this truly great man, his friends and enemies, his work habits, his interests in farming and charity, the gestation and difficult birth of his operas and other words -- and what we *don't* know, things that might still be discovered -- you've come to the right place. It has NEVER taken me so long to read a book because the pages are so densely detailed. That being said, I am very glad that I did. VERY glad. Here is a hero for the ages, pace his operas.

I can't imagine a more complete collection of information about Verdi's long and productive life. Phillips-Matz captures the feeling of mid-century Italy and among other things she shows how Verdi became a hero in the movement culminating in Italian statehood. Viva Verdi!

Viva Verdi is the opera lover's response to this magisterial work by Phillips-Matz. Her years of research has produced a detailed life of Verd. The author traces the family lineage of Verdi in Bussetto, chronicles the genesis of his operatic masterpieces and delves into the private life of the greatest Italian opera composer of the nineteenth century.
I dove into this huge book during Christmas 2002. The book will immerse you in the life of the complicated composer detailing his relationships, his tragedies and triumphs. The book
is essential to anyone interested in knowing more about Verdi and his times. The book is not easy reading but is worthwhile for the time it takes to peruse it. Viva Phillips-Matz on a superb biography!

There is little question that Mary Jane Phillips-Matz has provided us as complete an account of the life of Verdi as is likely to see a publisher's eye. It does have a number of excellent accounts of the composer's staging of operas, his distinct preferences and disdains, and his many interests outside the world of opera. Verdi, after all, was an enormously fascinating man. But the Phillips-Matz book frequently gets lost in a good deal of esoteric detail, especially about his many relations with people with whom he encountered in his rich life. Many of these these relations, such as those with Strepponi, Ricordi, and Barrezzi, to name only a few, are important and deserve the attention the author provides. But the book is cluttered with no-names that did not deserve the biographer's attention. It takes considerable patience, at times, to cross reference some of the less important characters that surrounded Verdi's life, but for whom Phillps-Matz drops in your lap just as you are tying her account together. And, for all of the credit she deserves for giving a full account of the life of the maestro, there are some topics of information that simply add nothing to the account of his life. Keep up with his travels, for instance. Some are consequential. Others reveal nothing of any consequence, and yet we are left to wade through them to get to material that has more bearing on the consequence of this man. So it's a good account, but one that takes incredible patience, and, at times, perseverence.

Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901) is one of the most famous operatic composers, and Mary Jane Phillips-Matz's 1993 book is likely to remain the definitive biography of him.

Her huge book is filled with interesting insights into the composer, and his life. She notes that early on, "his request to be admitted to the Milan Conservatory to study composition was rejected." Nevertheless, he became a "regional celebrity" in his early years for his chorus, and work as Music Master. However, "Verdi was still uneasy, mistrusting the capriciousness of the public, which he never ceased to regard as a potential enemy." But by age 33 in 1846, "he had moved into the glare of fame." From 1947, cries of "Viva Verdi!" attended performances of his operas.

Yet he was not an inveterate success; the premiere of Il coscaro in 1848 was a "fiasco," for example. Stiffelio aroused the cuts of the Italian censors. In January 1950, he actually broke off relations with his parents. In 1863, "his career seemed to be over," and he "had not had a box office success since Un ballo in maschera" in 1859. He was concentrating on his farm. However, with the success of Aida in 1871, however, he "had begun a new life."

It was interesting to learn that Verdi even held several political offices. In 1959 "he was offered the honour of representing his city as deputy to the Assembly of the Parma Provinces." In 1874 he was named "Senator of the Kingdom" by King Victor Emanuel II.

In 1883 upon Wagner's death (his main rival as an operatic composer) he wrote, "Sad! Sad! Sad! Wagner is dead!! ... A great individualist has disappeared!"

Although Verdi wrote some religious music, PHillips-Katz notes, "His determination to write a Requiem Mass is somewhat surprising, given the fact that many people considered him an atheist." His wife wrote, "His anticlericalism and refusal to believe in God or any higher power brought him close to atheism. 'I won't say he is an "atheist," but certainly not much of a believer."

Phillips-Katz concludes the book on the note, "Few heads of state have been tendered higher honours than Verdi."

If you're interested in Verdi or opera, this is THE book to buy about him.

I'm going to reluctantly disagree with the other reviewers here and say that while this is, indeed, a massively researched reference book, as a biography it is clumsy and awkward. Time and again narrative is sacrificed for detail. I began skimming after 100 pages and finally gave up and gave the book to the local library thrift shop.