Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 4.djvu/259

VERDI. to believe that Mozart, when only three years old, gave unmistakable hints of what he was afterwards to become; yet we can say, as an eye-witness, that M. Boito, the author of 'Mephistopheles,' a man of undeniable musical genius, did not reveal any decided aptitude for musical composition till nineteen; while several amongst his school-fellows who promised to be the rightful heirs of Rossini and Bellini are now teachers and conductors of provincial schools or second-rate theatres. Let us then bear no grudge to Basily, the then principal of the Conservatoire of Milan, nor let us depreciate him for not having been so gifted as to recognise in the young and unprepossessing organist of Le Roncole the man who was destined to write 'Il Rigoletto' twenty years afterwards.

But though failing to be admitted to the Conservatoire, Verdi stuck to the career which he had undertaken, and, on the advice of Alessandro Rolla, then conductor of 'La Scala,' he asked M. Lavigna to give him lessons in composition and orchestration. Lavigna was a distinguished musician and a composer of no ordinary merit; his operas, 'La Muta per amore,' 'L'Idolo di se stesso,' 'L'Impostore avvilito,' 'Coriolano,' 'Zaira,' and several others, having been performed several times with favourable success. He consented to give the lessons, and to him actually belongs the honour of being the teacher of Verdi.

This was in 1831, when Verdi was eighteen. The two years from 1831 to 1833 passed in an uninterrupted succession of exercises in harmony, counterpoint, and fugue, and a daily study of Mozart's 'Don Giovanni.' In 1833 the death of Provesi brought an entire change to Verdi. He went back to Busseto for five years, and after this lapse of time returned to Milan to take his start as a composer. We give, in the words of M. Ercole Cavalli—for this particular period the best-informed of the biographers—the lively description of Verdi's residence at Busseto.

'In 1833 M. Ferdinando Provesi died. The trustees of the Monte di Pietà, of Busseto, and the other contributors towards Verdi's musical training, had acted with the intention that, after Provesi's death, Verdi should be his successor both as Maestro di Cappella and Organist of the Cathedral, and also Conductor of the Philharmonic Society. Verdi felt very sorry for the death of Provesi; with him he had lost the man who first taught him the elements of his art, and showed him the way to excellence; and though Verdi felt a call to something nobler in life, yet he kept his word to his countrymen and went to Busseto to fill the place left vacant by his deceased professor. The appointment rested with the churchwardens of the Cathedral, men who either belonged to the clergy or were fanatic bigots, and therefore had but little liking for Verdi, whom they called "the fashionable maestrino," as being versed only in profane and operatic music; they preferred somebody cut a little more after their own pattern, and were anxious for a maestro well grounded in the Gregorian chant.

'Verdi's competitor, one M. Giovanni Ferrari, played indifferently on the organ, but had the strong support of two bishops; he gathered all the votes of the churchwardens, and the pupil of Provosi and Lavigna, for whom so many sacrifices had been made by the town, was black-balled. Upon hearing this decision, the Philharmonic Society, which for many years had made it a rule to enhance the solemnity of all the services in the cathedral by co-operating with their orchestra, lost all patience, and bursting tumultuously into the church, rummaged the archives and took away from them every sheet of music paper belonging to the Society; thereby beginning a civil war that lasted several years, in a town that was formerly an example of tranquillity and peace.

'On this followed satires, insults, affrays, riots, imprisonments, persecutions, banishments and the like; ending in decrees whereby the Philharmonic Society was prohibited to meet under any pretence whatever.'

Verdi next fell in love with Margherita, Barezzi's eldest daughter, whose father, unlike most fathers, did not oppose Margherita's union to a talented though very poor young man.

'In 1836 they were married. The whole Philharmonic Society attended the weddings; it was a happy and glorious day, and all were deeply moved by the prospect already opening before the young man: who, though born in the poorest condition, was at twenty-three already a composer, with the daughter of a rich and much respected man for his wife.'

In 1838 Verdi, with his wife and two children left Busseto and settled in Milan, with the hope of performing his opera 'Oberto Conte di S. Bonifacio.' We are now to witness the vicissitudes of a talented but nearly unknown young man, who comes to a large town, one of the most important musical centres of those days, with no fortune but the manuscript of a melodrama, and nothing to help him on but the golden opinions which his genius and honesty have previously won for him from a few friends; and we shall see this young man transformed in a short time into the favourite composer of all opera-goers. And we are glad to be able to give the relation of this most important period of an artist's career, in words that may be said to be Verdi's own.

The first part of the narrative refers to the time when he was in Milan, studying with Lavigna. On his return there his kind old master was gone—died while his pupil was at Busseto. And here is Verdi's narrative:—

'About the year 1833 or 34 there was in Milan a Philharmonic Society composed of first-rate vocalists, under the direction of one M. Masini. The Society was then in the bustle and hurry of arranging a performance of Haydn's Creation, at the Teatro Filodrammatico. M. Lavigna, my teacher of composition, asked me