Riccardo Muti explains why the music of Verdi transcends limits of time

In 2013, Riccardo Muti, then the CSO’s music director and now Music Director Emeritus for Life, spoke with CSO program-book annotator Phillip Huscher about Verdi’s sense of modernity, the influence of Wagner and why Verdi’s music will be with us forever.

This season, Muti returns for a Verdi-focused program March 19-21 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Chorus and guest vocalists soprano Lidia Fridman (in her CSO debut) and tenor Francesco Meli. Billed as an Opera Night with Riccardo Muti, the program consists of overtures, choruses and arias by Verdi; selections by Giordani and Catalani and the complete Act IV from Puccini’s Manon Lescaut.

Some highlights from that 2013 conversation:

For many years, Verdi’s music was not taken as seriously as that of other 19th-century composers. Do we still have much to learn about his music and his creative process?

When I visited his villa in Sant’Agata, where he lived most of his life, I remember that there was a huge package full of his manuscripts, including the first versions of many of his compositions. And on the box Verdi wrote that all of this was to be burned.

Fortunately, the members of his family didn’t follow his instructions, and one day this box will be opened, and we will understand the process that brought Verdi from the first idea to the final one.

We know that Verdi would prepare singers with unusual care, even given his own exacting standards. That was especially the case before the premiere of Macbeth in 1847.

He worked very hard in particular on the duet for Macbeth and Lady Macbeth, which is one of the most important scenes in the opera. Before the performance in the evening, Verdi called the baritone and the soprano to his room to rehearse the duet once again. The baritone said to Verdi: “But maestro, we have worked on this duet 46 times.” And Verdi said, “And this will be the 47th time.”

The year 2013 also marks the bicentennial of the birth of Wagner, who was one of the most influential figures in the history of music. But did he have any impact on Verdi?

It is interesting that many people say that Otello and Falstaff show the influence of Wagner on Verdi. I’ve been working on Verdi all my life, and at La Scala, I conducted six operas by Wagner. So I think I know quite enough to recognize any influence of Wagner on Verdi, and I can say that there is none at all.

Actually, Verdi was always very critical of Wagner, even though when Wagner died, Verdi wrote that a great musician had disappeared and this was a great tragedy for the world of music. When Lohengrin was performed in Bologna, Verdi and [Arrigo] Boito went to see the opera. We still have the piano score that Verdi had in his hands as he followed the opera, with his annotations. One of Verdi’s most frequent comments was “too long, too long.”

Why does Verdi’s music continue to be so popular?

Verdi is like Mozart — he speaks to us about our sins, our defects, all our qualities. And he is not like Beethoven, who points his finger and judges — because Beethoven was always a moralist. But Verdi addresses all of us — from North America to South America, Australia, Japan, China.

That’s the reason I think that, in the future, Verdi will become even more universal than Wagner. Verdi’s music will be of great comfort for generations and generations to come, because he speaks to us like one man speaking to another person.