Simon Boccanegra

For the biography of the first Doge of Genoa, see Simone Boccanegra.
Simon Boccanegra
Opera by Giuseppe Verdi

First edition libretto for the 1881 revision
Librettist Francesco Maria Piave, original version, 1857
Arrigo Boito, revisions for Teatro alla Scala, 24 March 1881 (1881-03-24)
Language Italian
Based on Antonio García Gutiérrez's Simón Bocanegra (1843)
Premiere 12 March 1857 (1857-03-12);
Salle Le Peletier (Paris Opéra)

Simon Boccanegra (Italian: [siˈmom bokkaˈneːɡra]) is an opera with a prologue and three acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on the play Simón Bocanegra (1843) by Antonio García Gutiérrez, whose play El trovador had been the basis for Verdi's 1853 opera, Il trovatore.

Simon Boccanegra was first performed at Teatro La Fenice in Venice on 12 March 1857. Given the complications of the original plot and the generally poor popular response - although the critical one was more encouraging - the opera dropped out of favour after 1866. Finally, 23 years later, Verdi's publisher persuaded the composer to revise the opera, with text changes to be prepared by Arrigo Boito, the librettist who aspired to work with the aging composer on a project which eventually became a new opera, Otello, but to which Verdi had not totally committed at that time.

The revised version of Simon Boccanegra, with the now-famous Council Chamber scene, was first performed at La Scala in Milan on 24 March 1881. It is this version which is the one frequently performed today.

Composition history: the 1857 version

Musicologist and author, Julian Budden points to three projects which the composer had in mind when, at the beginning of 1855, he turned down an invitation from La Fenice to write a new opera for them for the following year. He responded: "the chief obstacle is my unshakable determination not to bind myself anymore to a definite period for either the composition or the production".[1] While that approach did not turn out to be practicable at that time, it was an ultimate goal and, in aiming to achieve it, his partner of the previous four years, Giuseppina Strepponi greatly encouraged it when she wrote to him at the time of his frustrations two years earlier when working in Paris on Les vêpres siciliennes.

The only project for which there was forward motion was towards accomplishing his long-planned Re Lear, an opera to be based on King Lear, for which his new librettist (following Salvadore Cammarano's death) was Antonio Somma. But a year later, when overseeing a revival of La traviata at La Fenice, he agreed to a new opera for that house for the 1856/7 season,[2] and he proposed the Gutiérrez play, which Budden presumes he had read in translation. Budden also presumes that the translation had been done by Strepponi,[3] because she had been the translator of Gutiérrez' other play which had become Il trovatore.

The somewhat convoluted plot of Simon Boccanegra is hard to follow, as Budden notes: "All the characters define themselves against an ingeniously shifting pattern of intrigue such as can be highly effective in a play but well-nigh impossible to follow in an opera".[3] Verdi had gone so far as to actually write out the scenario in prose, which he then submitted to Piave in August; all that he expected from his librettist was that it would be turned into poetry, so Verdi balked somewhat when the censors demanded a complete poetic version: "what does it matter for the moment it's in prose or verse?"[4] He pushed harder, stating that "I plan to compose music for a prose libretto! What do you think of that?"[5] In the end, there was a poetic version and all was well: it was accepted by the opera house and the censors.

Beginning in July and throughout most of the period of the preparation of the libretto, the composer and Strepponi had been in Paris taking care of securing various performance and publication rights, including working on a translated version of Il trovatore, the opera which became Le trouvère. Piave was informed that Verdi's stay would need to be lengthened and everything would be handled between them and the Venetian authorities by mail.

However, Verdi's dissatisfaction with some of the librettist's work led him to find a local collaborator to help revise some of the sections. Accordingly, he called upon an Italian exile in Paris, the politician, former professor of law, poet and writer Giuseppe Montanelli,[6] to do this. Piave learned nothing of the revisions until he received a note from Verdi: "Here is the libretto, shortened and altered more or less as it must be. You can put your name to or it, just as you please". However, he also learned nothing of the anonymous collaborator either.[7] After the premiere of Le trouvère on 12 January 1857, Verdi and Strepponi left Paris to return to Italy, then both went to Venice for the March premiere.

However, the relationship was soon restored and Piave came to Sant'Agata in April to work on some revisions, but it was the libretto which came in for the heaviest criticism: "It was generally condemned as one of the most unintelligible to have reached the stage" notes Kimball and its general dark and gloomy feel was to affect its fortunes for many years.[8]

Composition history: the 1881 revision

Doge's costume for the 1881 revision

In 1868, Giulio Ricordi suggested the idea of revisions to Boccanegra; the idea was again broached ten years later, early in 1879, but was shrugged off by Verdi with a note saying that the 1857 score, which had been sent to the composer for review, would remain untouched "just as you sent it to me".[9] Persisting with further attempts to convince the composer, Ricordi had also broached the idea of a collaboration with Arrigo Boito for a new opera based on Shakespeare's Othello. Musicologist Roger Parker speculates that Verdi's final agreement to revise Boccanegra was based on a desire to "test the possibility" of working with Boito before possibly embarking on the larger project.[10]

Once Verdi began to re-look at his earlier work, objections - and new ideas - began to emerge: "the score is not possible as it stands" and "I shall have to redo all the second act [1857: act 2, which became act 1 in the 1881 revision] and give it more contrast and variety, more life" are examples of his reasoning, which he laid out in a letter to Ricordi in November 1880.[11] His principal concern was how to make changes to the 1857, act 2. "I have said in general it needs something to give life and variety to the drama's excessive gloom", he writes[11] and he continues by recalling:

two magnificent letters of Petrarch's, one addressed to [the historical] Boccanegra, the other to the [then-]Doge of Venice, warning them not to start a fratricidal war, and reminding them that both were sons of the same mother, Italy, and so on. This idea of an Italian fatherland at this time was quite sublime![11]

In spite of the complexity of many of Boito's proposed ideas, along with his alternative scenarios, which are expressed in a long letter to Verdi [12](most of which the composer regarded as excessive), the Council Chamber scene emerged as the focus of the new collaboration. Although he had confidence in the young librettist's abilities ("[The scene] written by you could not possibly be dull"[13]), Verdi did caution Boito that he appeared to be "aiming at a perfection impossible here. I [Verdi] aim lower and am more optimistic than you and I don't despair",[13] in essence, expressing an unwillingness to re-write the opera as completely as Boito had proposed. It would have been far more work than the composer wished to be involved in at the time.

The pair spent the latter part of 1880 and into January 1881 with back-and-forth additions and revisions (the composer in Genoa, the librettist in Milan and meeting only once),[14] all of which are heavily documented in the Verdi-Boito correspondence, the Carteggio Verdi-Boito, and significantly quoted in Budden. All this was the build-up to performances in Milan the following March, although the composer was constantly concerned about the suitability of the singers engaged there for that season, and he threatened to withdraw the opera on more than one occasion.[14]

The result was the contrast, which Parker describes, between the original 1857 act 2 finale, "set in a large square in Genoa, [as] a conventional four-movement concertante finale, a grand ceremonial scene" whereas, in the 1881 revision, "[Verdi] injected into the heart of the work an episode of enormous vividness and power, enriching the character of Boccanegra in such a way that his subsequent death scene gains considerably in impressiveness".[15] And, as Budden puts it, "Simone (sic) rises to spiritual greatness. For the first time, his moral authority puts forth all its strength, ... positively as in the appeal for peace ..."[16]

Performance history

Original 1857 version

While not a popular success, it did garner some critical acclaim, "with the music being praised for its fidelity to the text, the orchestration for its elegance, the melody for its inspiration" noted the Gazzetta Musicale,[6] but Budden notes that "complaints of 'obscurity', 'severity', harmonic abstruseness' are heard from even the most respectful of critics".[17] And Verdi himself was fairly blunt in his assessment: "I've had a fiasco in Venice almost as great as that of La traviata" he reported to Clara Maffei.[18]

Following its 1857 premiere, Simon Boccanegra was performed in Regio Emilia, "where it triumphed ...  ... and again in Naples in 1858 ..."[17] There was similar acclaim after the Rome presentation about the same time, but "on the other hand, Boccanegra had been laughed off the stage in Florence" and "had been a fiasco at La Scala in 1859".[17]

It was given in Malta in 1860, Madrid and Lisbon in 1861, and Buenos Aires and Montevideo in 1862, but, after that, it almost completely disappeared with only a sporadic performance or two, including Corfu in 1870 and Alexandria in late 1880.[19]

A concert performance of the original version, possibly its first hearing in 100 years (and its UK premiere), took place at the Golders Green Hippodrome in London on 2 August 1975 before an invited audience "masterminded" [19] by Julian Budden with Sesto Bruscantini in the title role and Andre Turp as Gabriele. This production was broadcast on 1 January 1976 and issued on CD. It was also performed by the Royal Opera, London as a concert performances in June 1995[8] with Anthony Michaels-Moore and Jose Cura and staged at Covent Garden in June 1997 with Sergei Leiferkus and Plácido Domingo in the two male roles named above. The Amelias in the 1995 and 1997 versions were Amanda Roocroft and Kallen Esperian respectively.[19]

Set design by Girolamo Magnani for 1881 revision

In August 1999 there was a set of performances at the Festival della Valle d'Itria in Martina Franca, which was recorded. That same year it was given by New York Grand Opera, this being its first New York performance.[20] Sarasota Opera, in its "Verdi Cycle" series of all of the composer's works, gave it its American premiere in 1992.[21]

Revised version of 1881

It is this later version, unveiled in 1881 in Milan, and given in Vienna and Paris in 1882 and 1883, respectively, that has become part of the standard operatic repertory.[22] Recordings of Simon Boccanegra demonstrate the frequency of live performances given since the 1950s, while Operabase, the database of opera stagings given or planned to be given throughout the world going forward from 1 January 2011, shows 180 performances of 37 productions in 28 cities up to 2015. [23]

Roles

Role Voice type Premiere cast
12 March 1857[24]
(Conductor: – )		 Revised version
Premiere cast
24 March 1881[24]
(Conductor: Franco Faccio)[25]
Simon Boccanegra, a corsair,
later the first Doge of Genoa		 baritone Leone Giraldoni Victor Maurel
Jacopo Fiesco, a Genoese nobleman,
known as Andrea Grimaldi		 bass Giuseppe Echeverria Édouard de Reszke
Maria Boccanegra, his daughter,
known as Amelia Grimaldi		 soprano Luigia Bendazzi Anna D'Angeri
Gabriele Adorno, a Genoese gentleman tenor Carlo Negrini Francesco Tamagno
Paolo Albiani, a goldsmith and the
Doge's favourite courtier		 baritone Giacomo Vercellini Federico Salvati
Pietro, a Genoese popular leader
and courtier		 bass Andrea Bellini Giovanni Bianco
Captain of the Crossbowmen tenor Angelo Fiorentini
Amelia's maid mezzo-soprano Fernanda Capelli
Soldiers, sailors, people, senators, the Doge's court, prisoners – Chorus

Synopsis

Time: The middle of the 14th century.
Place: In and around Genoa.

Prologue

(Act 1 in the 1857 Original)

A piazza in front of the Fieschi palace[11][26]

Paolo Albiani, a plebeian, tells his ally Pietro that in the forthcoming election of the Doge, his choice for the plebeian candidate is Simon Boccanegra. Boccanegra arrives and is persuaded to stand when Paolo hints that if Boccanegra becomes Doge, the aristocratic Jacopo Fiesco will surely allow him to wed his daughter Maria. When Boccanegra has gone, Paolo gossips about Boccanegra's love affair with Maria Fiesco – Boccanegra and Maria have had a child, and the furious Fiesco has locked his daughter away in his palace. Pietro rallies a crowd of citizens to support Boccanegra. After the crowd has dispersed, Fiesco comes out of his palace, stricken with grief; Maria has just died (Il lacerato spirito – "The tortured soul of a sad father"). He swears vengeance on Boccanegra for destroying his family. When he meets Boccanegra he does not inform him of Maria's death. Boccanegra offers reconciliation and Fiesco promises clemency only if Boccanegra lets him have his granddaughter. Boccanegra explains he cannot because the child, put in the care of a nurse, has vanished. He enters the palace and finds the body of his beloved just before crowds pour in, hailing him as the new Doge.

Act 1

(Act 2 in the 1857 Original)

[Twenty-five years have passed. Historically the action has moved from 1339, the year of Simon's election in the prologue, forward for acts 1, 2 and 3, to 1363, the year of Simon's death]
[The Doge has exiled many of his political opponents and confiscated their property. Among them is Jacopo Fiesco, who has been living in the Grimaldi palace, using the name Andrea Grimaldi to avoid discovery and plotting with Boccanegra's enemies to overthrow the Doge. The Grimaldis have adopted an orphaned child of unknown parentage after discovering her in a convent (she is in fact Boccanegra's child, Maria (known as Amelia) named after her mother, and she is Fiesco's granddaughter). They called her Amelia, hoping that she would be the heir to their family's fortune, their sons having been exiled and their own baby daughter having died. Amelia is now a young woman.]

Scene 1: A garden in the Grimaldi palace, before sunrise

Amelia is awaiting her lover, Gabriele Adorno (Aria:Come in quest'ora bruna – "How in the morning light / The sea and stars shine brightly"). She suspects him of plotting against the Doge and when he arrives she warns him of the dangers of political conspiracy. Word arrives that the Doge is coming. Amelia, fearing that the Doge will force her to marry Paolo, now his councilor, urges Adorno to ask her guardian Andrea (in reality, Fiesco) for permission for them to marry: Sì, sì dell'ara il giubilo / contrasti il fato avverso - "Yes, let the joy of marriage be set against unkind fate".

[1857 original version: the duet ended with a cabaletta (set to the same words as the 1881 text)[27] then "a coda and a battery of chords followed by applause."][28]

Fiesco reveals to Adorno that Amelia is not a Grimaldi, but a foundling adopted by the family. When Adorno says that he does not care, Fiesco blesses the marriage. Boccanegra enters and tells Amelia that he has pardoned her exiled brothers. She tells him that she is in love, but not with Paolo who she refuses to marry. Boccanegra has no desire to force Amelia into a marriage against her will. She tells him that she was adopted and that she has one souvenir of her mother, a picture in a locket. The two compare Amelia's picture with Boccanegra's, and Boccanegra realizes that she is his long-lost daughter. Finally reunited, they are overcome with joy. Amelia goes into the palace. Soon after, Paolo arrives to find out if Amelia has accepted him. Boccanegra tells him that the marriage will not take place. Furious, Paolo arranges for Amelia to be kidnapped.

Scene 2: The council chamber

[1881 revision: This entire scene was added by Verdi and Boito in place of the 1857 scene, which took place in a large square in Genoa.] [29][30]

The Doge encourages his councillors to make peace with Venice. He is interrupted by the sounds of a mob calling for blood. Paolo suspects that his kidnapping plot has failed. The Doge prevents anyone leaving the council chamber and orders the doors to be thrown open. A crowd bursts in, chasing Adorno. Adorno confesses to killing Lorenzino, a plebeian, who had kidnapped Amelia, claiming to have done so at the order of a high-ranking official. Adorno incorrectly guesses the official was Boccanegra and is about to attack him when Amelia rushes in and stops him (Aria: Nell'ora soave – "At that sweet hour which invites ecstasy / I was walking alone by the sea"). She describes her abduction and escape. Before she is able to identify her kidnapper, fighting breaks out once more. Boccanegra establishes order and has Adorno arrested for the night (Aria: Plebe! Patrizi! Popolo! – "Plebeians! Patricians! Inheritors / Of a fierce history"). He orders the crowd to make peace and they praise his mercy. Realizing that Paolo is responsible for the kidnapping, Boccanegra places him in charge of finding the culprit. He then makes everyone, including Paolo, utter a curse on the kidnapper.

Act 2

(Act 3 in the 1857 Original)

The Doge's apartments

[1881 revised version: There are some small adjustments in this act which include expanding Paolo's opening aria, thus giving him greater stature in the work: Me stesso ho maledetto! / "I have cursed myself", the wording of which was originally: O doge ingrato ... ch'io rinunci Amelia e i suoi tesori? / "O ungrateful Doge! ... Must I give up Amelia and her charms".] [31]

Paolo has imprisoned Fiesco. Determined to kill Boccanegra, Paolo pours a slow-acting poison into the Doge's water, and then tries to convince Fiesco to murder Boccanegra in return for his freedom. Fiesco refuses. Paolo next suggests to Adorno that Amelia is the Doge's mistress, hoping Adorno will murder Boccanegra in a jealous rage. Adorno is furious (Aria: Sento avvampar nell'anima – "I feel a furious jealousy / Setting my soul on fire"). Amelia enters the Doge's apartments, seeming to confirm Adorno's suspicions, and he angrily accuses her of infidelity. She claims only to love him, but cannot reveal her secret – that Boccanegra is her father – because Adorno's family were killed by the Doge. Adorno hides as Boccanegra is heard approaching. Amelia confesses to Boccanegra that she is in love with his enemy Adorno. Boccanegra is angry, but tells his daughter that if the young nobleman changes his ways, he may pardon him. He asks Amelia to leave, and then takes a drink of the poisoned water, which Paolo has placed on the table. He falls asleep. Adorno emerges and is about to kill Boccanegra, when Amelia returns in time to stop him. Boccanegra wakes and reveals to Adorno that Amelia is his daughter. Adorno begs for Amelia's forgiveness (Trio: Perdon, Amelia ... Indomito – "Forgive me, Amelia ... A wild, / Jealous love was mine"). Noises of fighting are heard – Paolo has stirred up a revolution against the Doge. Adorno promises to fight for Boccanegra, who vows that Adorno shall marry Amelia if he can crush the rebels.

Act 3

(Act 4 in the 1857 Original)

[1857 original version: Act 4 opened with a double male voice chorus, and a confused dialogue involving references to details in the original play.][32]

Inside the Doge's palace

The uprising against the Doge has been put down. Paolo has been condemned to death for fighting with the rebels against the Doge. Fiesco is released from prison by the Doge's men. On his way to the scaffold, Paolo boasts to Fiesco that he has poisoned Boccanegra. Fiesco is deeply shocked. He confronts Boccanegra, who is now dying from Paolo's poison. Boccanegra recognizes his old enemy and tells Fiesco that Amelia is his granddaughter. Fiesco feels great remorse and tells Boccanegra about the poison. Adorno and Amelia, newly married, arrive to find the two men reconciled. Boccanegra tells Amelia that Fiesco is her grandfather and, before he dies, names Adorno his successor. The crowd mourn the death of the Doge.

Music

Budden makes a useful observation on the musical qualities of the original version: "all the devices that we associate with the term bel canto are sparingly used"[33] and he suggests that, at mid-century, "this amounted to a denial of Italy's national birthright"[33] for an audience brought up on the conventions employed by Bellini or Donizetti. In his "Introduction to the 1881 Score", James Hepokowski emphasizes that Budden's assertion appeared to be true, since the 1857 original "resounded with clear echoes of [Verdi's] earlier style" and that he employed the known techniques but, at the same time, moved away from them, so that:

the basic musical conventions of the Risorgimento (separate numbers with breaks for applause, multi-movement arias and duets with repetitive codas, cadenzas and repeated cabalettas, static concertato ensembles, and so on) were indeed present, if usually modified [so that] the musical discourse was characteristically terse, angular, and muscular.[34]

Budden goes on to suggest the implications of this move away from the standard forms, albeit that "[it] was a daring, innovative work. Without altering the letter of the contemporary Italian forms, it certainly altered their spirit ... Quite unheard of was a protagonist without a single extended lyrical solo to himself.[16] Additionally, Budden suggests that musically "the richness and subtlety of the musical language acquired over twenty-four years suffice to fill out Simon's personality further.[16]

The 1881 revisions then, which, in most cases, did not require changes in the libretto, were made to the music by Verdi. As David Kimble demonstrates with a few examples, areas such as which illustrate more refined use of the orchestra include the first scene of the Prologue: "the dialogue, instead of being punctuated by the customary figurations of accompanied recitative, is set against a gravely flowing orchestral theme."[35]

Recordings

1857 Original version

Year Cast
(Boccanegra, Maria, Adorno, Fiesco)		 Conductor,
Opera House and Orchestra		 Label[36]
1975Sesto Bruscantini,
Josella Ligi,
André Turp,
Gwynne Howell		 John Matheson,
BBC Concert Orchestra and the BBC Singers
(Recording of a concert performance in the Golders Green Hippodrome on 2 August; broadcast on 1 January 1976)		CD: Opera Rara
Cat: ORCV 302
1999 Vitorio Vitelli,
Annalisa Raspagliosi,
Warren Mok,
Francesco Ellero d'Artegna 		Renato Palumbo,
Orchestra Internationale d'Italia
(Recording made at performances at the Festival della Valle d'Itria, Martina Franca, 4, 6, 8 August)		CD: Dynamic,
268/1-2

1881 Revised version

Year Cast:
(Boccanegra,
Amelia (Maria),
Gabiele Adorno,
Jacobo Fiesco)		 Conductor,
Opera House and Orchestra		 Label[36]
1939Lawrence Tibbett,
Elisabeth Rethberg,
Giovanni Martinelli,
Ezio Pinza 		Ettore Panizza,
Metropolitan Opera Orchestra & Chorus 		CD: Myto Historical
Cat: 981H006
1951Paolo Silveri,
Antonietta Stella,
Carlo Bergonzi,
Mario Petri 		Francesco Molinari-Pradelli,
Coro e Orchestra di Roma della RAI 		CD: Warner Fonit
Cat: 5050467 7906-2
1957Tito Gobbi,
Victoria de los Ángeles,
Giuseppe Campora,
Boris Christoff		 Gabriele Santini,
Teatro dell'Opera di Roma orchestra and chorus 		CD: EMI
Cat: CDMB 63513
(Digitally remastered, 1990)
1958Tito Gobbi,
Leyla Gencer,
Mirto Picchi,
Ferruccio Mazzoli		Mario Rossi,
Teatro di San Carlo Orchestra and Chorus, Naples
(Video recording of a performance at Naples and audio recording of its soundtrack, 26 December) 		VHS Video, PAL only: Hardy Classics
Cat: HCA 60002-2
CD: Hardy Classics
HCA 6002-2
1973 Piero Cappuccilli,
Katia Ricciarelli,
Plácido Domingo,
Ruggero Raimondi 		Gianandrea Gavazzeni,
RCA Italiana Opera Chorus and Orchestra 		CD: RCA Records
Cat: RD 70729
1976 Piero Cappuccilli,
Katia Ricciarelli,
Giorgio Merighi,
Nicolai Ghiaurov		 Oliviero De Fabritiis,
NHK Symphony Orchestra and Union of Japan Professional Choruses, Tokyo
(Recording of a performance in Tokyo, October)		 DVD: Premiere Opera Ltd
5173;
Video Artists International
Cat: VAI 4484
1977 Piero Cappuccilli,
Mirella Freni,
José Carreras,
Nicolai Ghiaurov 		Claudio Abbado,
Coro e Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala 		CD: DG
Cat: 449 752-2
1984 Sherrill Milnes,
Anna Tomowa-Sintow,
Vasile Moldoveanu,
Paul Plishka		 James Levine,
Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and Chorus
(Video recording of a performance at the Met, 29 December)		 DVD: Pioneer Classics
Cat: PIBC 2010;
Deutsche Grammophon
Cat: 073 4403
1988 Leo Nucci,
Kiri Te Kanawa,
Giacomo Aragall,
Paata Burchuladze 		Georg Solti,
Coro e Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala 		CD: Decca
Cat: 475 7011
1995 Vladimir Chernov,
Kiri Te Kanawa,
Plácido Domingo,
Robert Lloyd 		James Levine,
Metropolitan Opera orchestra and chorus 		DVD: Deutsche Grammophon
Cat: 00440 073 0319
2010Plácido Domingo,
Adrianne Pieczonka,
Marcello Giordani,
James Morris		James Levine,
Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and Chorus, New York
(Recording of live performance at the Metropolitan Opera, January/February)		DVD: Sony
Cat: 780664
2015Dmitri Hvorostovsky,
Barbara Frittoli,
Stephano Secco,
Ildar Abdrazakov		 Constantine Orbelian
Kaunas City Symphony Orchestra and Kaunas State Choir		 CD:Delos
Cat:DE 3457[37]

References

Notes

  1. ↑ Verdi to Tornielli (from La Fenice), 16 February 1855, in Budden, p. 245
  2. ↑ Osborne, C., p. 295
  3. 1 2 Budden 1984, Vol. 2, pp. 245–248
  4. ↑ Verdi to Piave, 3 September 1856, in Budden. p. 247
  5. ↑ Verdi to Piave, 3 September 1856, in Phillips-Matz, p. 352
  6. 1 2 Osborne, C., p. 296
  7. ↑ Verdi to Piave, date unknown, in Budden, p. 249
  8. 1 2 Kimbell 2001, in Holden, p 997
  9. ↑ Verdi to Ricordi, 2 May 1879, in Budden 1984, Vol. 2, p. 255
  10. ↑ Parker, p. 382
  11. 1 2 3 4 Verdi to Ricordi, 20 November 1880, in Werfel and Stefan, pp. 360–361
  12. ↑ Boito to Verdi, 8 December 1880, in Budden, pp. 256–258
  13. 1 2 Verdi to Boito, 11 December 1880, in Budden, p. 258
  14. 1 2 Phillips-Matz, p. 658
  15. ↑ Parker, in Sadie (Ed.), pp. 383–384
  16. 1 2 3 Budden, p. 329
  17. 1 2 3 Budden, pp. 253–254
  18. ↑ Verdi to C. Maffei, 29 March 1857, in Budden, p. 253
  19. 1 2 3 George Hall, "A Performance and Reception History" in Kahn (Ed.), pp. 44–45
  20. ↑ NYGO's list of performances
  21. ↑ Sarasota's "Verdi Cycle" list of performances
  22. ↑ Loewenberg, (1978) p. ?
  23. ↑ Stagings of Simon Boccanegra which appear on Operabase. This number may change as new productions are announced. Retrieved 9 August 2013
  24. 1 2 List of singers taken from Budden, p. 244
  25. ↑ Budden, p. 267
  26. ↑ Rodolfo Celletti, "A Historical Perspective", in Kahn, (ed.) p. 11
  27. ↑ Kahn, (Ed.), pp. 87 and 179 illustrate the difference
  28. ↑ Budden, p. 294: He explains that "operatic architecture, if not common sense, demands a cabaletta at this point.
  29. ↑ Kahn, pp. 187–197
  30. ↑ Budden, pp. 303–309, for details of the original
  31. ↑ Kahn, pp. 1133 and 199
  32. ↑ Kahn, p. 201; also see Budden, p. 322
  33. 1 2 Budden, p. 254
  34. ↑ James Hepokoski, in Kahn, p. 15
  35. ↑ Kimbell 2001, in Holden, p. 1007
  36. 1 2 Recordings of Simon Boccanegra from operadis-opera-discography.org.uk
  37. ↑ Judith Malafronte (July 2015). "Verdi: Simon Boccanegra". Opera News 80 (1).

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