Don Carlos (Verdi)

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Work data
Title: Don Carlos
Poster from 1867

Poster from 1867

Shape: Opera in five or four acts
Original language: 1) French
2) composed in French, performed in Italian translation
Music: Giuseppe Verdi
Libretto : Joseph Méry , Camille du Locle
Literary source: Friedrich Schiller : Don Carlos
Premiere: 1) March 11, 1867
2) January 10, 1884
Place of premiere: 1) Paris Opera
2) Teatro alla Scala , Milan
Playing time: 1) approx. 4 hours
2) approx. 3 hours
Place and time of the action: France (1st act) and Spain around 1560
people

Don Carlos is an opera by Giuseppe Verdi based on Friedrich Schiller's dramatic poem Don Karlos, Infant von Spanien . Verdi had the work played in different versions and with different lengths. The French original from 1867 belongs to the Grand Opéra genre and has five acts. In the past, the second, shortened version ( Don Carlo ) from 1884 was usually performed in four acts in Italian, today mostly the last version, also in Italian, but again in five acts. Some theaters experiment with mixed versions from different versions.

Action of the five act version

first act

Fontainebleau forest

On an icy winter evening, starving loggers in the Fontainebleau forest lament the catastrophic living conditions caused by the Franco-Spanish War . On the hunt, Princess Elisabeth of Valois of France meets the hungry with her entourage and announces the signing of a peace treaty that same evening, which is to be sealed by her marriage to Don Carlos, the heir to the Spanish throne. Having traveled secretly to Fontainebleau, Don Carlos waits in the forest for his promised bride, the princess. Since the two have never seen each other, he wants to get to know her incognito before the wedding. Elisabeth, who got lost in the forest with her page Thibault, meets Don Carlos, who first introduces himself to her as his own envoy and falls in love with her. She is excited to see her fiancé, and when he shows her a picture of Don Carlos, she sees that he is standing in front of her. They confess their love to one another.

Thibault, who has rushed to the castle to get help for the princess, returns and greets Elizabeth as the Spanish queen. The Count of Lerma brings her the news that the peace between France and Spain could only be secured by a wedding between her and King Philip, Don Carlos' father. You must give your consent on the spot. The impoverished population begs her to agree to the wedding, but her heart wants to keep the love she has just found for Don Carlos. Finally she breathes a voiceless "Oui", the people cheer, but a world collapses for Elisabeth and Don Carlos.

Second act

First image: cloister of the monastery of Saint-Just

In front of the monastery of Yuste , in which the tomb of Emperor Charles V lies, Don Carlos asks to be forgotten. His fiancée Elisabeth married his father, but he cannot suppress or even forget his love for Elisabeth. The Marquis of Posa, Rodrigue, arrives and tells his friend Don Carlos about the unspeakable conditions in Flanders . Carlos relieves his heart, he tells of his unattainable love for his stepmother. Rodrigue suggests that Carlos forget his worries in Flanders in the fight against oppression. They swear eternal friendship to one another.

Second picture: cheerful place at the gates of the monastery of Saint-Just

In the garden of the monastery of Yuste, the queen's ladies-in-waiting pass the time singing with Princess Eboli, who is in love with Don Carlos. Rodrigue gives the Queen a letter from her mother from Paris, along with a secret note from Don Carlos. In it, Carlos asks Elisabeth to trust the messenger, and he asks for an interview. Elisabeth agrees. Don Carlos asks Elisabeth to influence his father, who refuses to allow him to work in Flanders. But then his love overtakes him, he falls at her feet, but when he tries to hug her, she pushes him away and says he must kill his father to get her. Philipp appears after Carlos ran away disturbed. Annoyed to find the queen alone, contrary to court protocol, he banishes the responsible Countess von Aremberg back to France. Elisabeth, appalled by this public insult, sadly bids farewell to her closest confidante. When the court has dispersed, the king listens to the liberal Rodrigue, who wants to discuss the events in Flanders with him. Philip insists on his hard hand to keep control in Flanders, but he secretly admires Rodrigue for his modern and open manner. He makes Rodrigue a confidante and asks him to keep an eye on Don Carlos, but he also warns him before the (almighty) Grand Inquisitor .

Third act

First image: The Queen's Gardens

Philip's coronation celebrations are approaching their climax. Elisabeth exchanges masks with Princess Eboli in order to escape the hustle and bustle. Don Carlos appears and confesses his love to the supposed Elisabeth again and is horrified when he discovers that it is Eboli. Eboli understands the truth and wants to denounce him. Rodrigue suddenly appears and threatens to stab the princess. However, Don Carlos can dissuade him. Rodrigue asks Carlos to give him treasonous papers on the situation in Flanders. He hesitates, knowing that Rodrigue is the king's confidante, but finally lets himself be convinced of his friend's loyalty.

Second picture: a large square in front of Valladolid Cathedral.

In a grand ceremony, the auto-da-fe , the culmination of the celebrations is the burning of traitors and heretics who have fallen victim to the Inquisition . Six Flemish envoys ask for mercy for their country, the request is supported by Elisabeth, Rodrigue and Carlos. He renews his wish to go to Flanders. When Philip refuses, Carlos draws his sword against the king, nobody dares to intervene. After all, it is Rodrigue who takes the gun from Carlos to prevent worse from happening. The king appoints him duke, Don Carlos is arrested. The auto-da-fe begins.

Fourth act

First picture: The King's Cabinet in Valladolid

In the study, the king ponders his mortality, his loneliness and his relationship with his wife Elisabeth, who has never loved him. The blind Grand Inquisitor appears and advises the king to hand Rodrigue over to the Inquisition, since he, with his liberal views, poses a much greater danger than Don Carlos. The king defends himself because he sees Rodrigue as an equal person, even as a confidante, the only one he has. But the Grand Inquisitor, who has long since fled everything earthly, warns Philip that kings too must answer to the Inquisition.

Elisabeth complains to the king about the theft of an important box with personal documents. She is horrified when the king presents her with the box he received from Eboli. When Philipp forcibly opens it, he finds a picture of Don Carlos in it. He accuses her of infidelity and curses her. When Rodrigue and Eboli rush to help, Eboli realizes their guilt, Rodrigue scolds the king for his lack of restraint. Eboli not only confesses the theft to the queen, but also accuses herself of adultery with the king and confesses her love for Don Carlos. The queen orders her to leave the court the next day. Left alone, Eboli wants to save Don Carlos as the last good deed.

Second picture: Don Carlos' prison

Rodrigue visits Don Carlos in prison to bid him farewell because the papers found on him reveal his guilt. Rodrigue is fatally hit by an ambush shot. As he dies, he tells his friend that Elisabeth is waiting for him at the St. Juste monastery. Eboli has mobilized the people to release Don Carlos, but the uprising is ended by the Grand Inquisitor and Philip.

Fifth act

Cloister of the Convent of Saint-Just

Elisabeth and Don Carlos meet in front of Charles V's grave. He has given up dreaming and wants to try to save Flanders. They say goodbye one last time. The two are surprised by Philip and the Grand Inquisitor. Before Don Carlos can be extradited, however, an old monk appears and pulls him back into the darkness of the monastery. Everyone is shocked to have heard the voice of Charles V.

Instrumentation

The orchestral line-up for the opera includes the following instruments:

Don Carlos, 1867

Don Carlo, 1884

Work history

179th performance of Verdi's Don Carlo at the Metropolitan Opera (2005)

Verdi composed Don Carlos between 1865 and 1867 based on a text book by Joseph Méry and Camille du Locle (commissioned by the Paris Opera), based on Friedrich Schiller's play Don Carlos (1787) and the plays Eugène Cormons , Marie-Joseph Chéniers and Alexandre Soumets based. The opera premiered on March 11, 1867 in Paris. In October of the same year it was translated into Italian ( Don Carlo ) and performed in Bologna as a five-act act. However, after some cuts, Verdi decided to make some radical changes, and so it was performed as a four-act version in Milan on January 10, 1884, almost twenty years after the beginning of the composition . This version, out of seven, is currently the most played.

Even before the first performance in 1867, the opera had to be shortened by 20 minutes, because if it lasted almost five hours, many visitors would no longer have reached the last suburban trains. So was u. a. the 15-minute ballet interlude deleted. This ballet, like the great ceremonial scene of the auto-café, was part of the good form at the Paris Opera, to which the French audience at the Grand Opéra was used. Verdi was never able to make friends with Paris and its customs and always spent as short a time as possible in France. He preferred to work in his Sant'Agata estate, where he found the necessary peace and quiet to compose.

Differences between the versions

Today many theaters are trying their hand at the original French version again. The duet between Don Carlos and Posa is much longer. The “memory motif” in the last part of the duet, which recurs in the garden scene and after Posa's death, is also included. The four-act version in Milan, which was the most played until the 1970s due to its shorter playing time, has largely gone out of fashion today because the main storylines and motivations of the protagonists remain unclear. The most important passages that Verdi had deleted and only included in its latest version:

  • the entire first act (the meeting in Fontainebleau forest). For musical reasons, a few passages have been included in the first act of the new version. Why Elisabeth, who loves Don Carlos, did not marry him, but the king (for reasons of state), remains without explanation in the four-act version. The opening choir of the opera, in which the starving woodcutters complain about their situation, was canceled before the premiere and replaced by a much shorter hunter choir. This line has also been opened more and more in recent years, as it explains why Elizabeth agrees to marry Philip.
  • the scene in which Elisabeth and Eboli exchange their masks. This puzzles how Don Carlos confuses the two women.
  • the ballet. Can be safely deleted as far as the plot is concerned; serves only to entertain the king - and the public.
  • an important line of text: Eboli's confession that she is the king's mistress. Eboli accuses himself of stealing the box and of loving Don Carlos. Elisabeth would certainly have excused these offenses. But Eboli also accuses himself of adultery. Who she seduced, the king, remains unclear in the abridged version because four bars are missing.
  • the finale of Act IV contains a duet between Philip and Don Carlos (with male choir). When Philipp and Carlos mourn the dead Posa, a melody sounds that Verdi's revised as Lacrimosa in the Requiem.
  • the finale of act V is much longer. The role of the Grand Inquisitor is more important. The Holy Office also has its say through interjections from the choir.

In the meantime, the musicologist Ursula Günther has found out that there are probably seven versions of Don Carlos , four up to the second performance alone. This fourth, plus the sixth and seventh versions are the most played versions to date; the sixth version is four acts, the fourth and seventh are five acts.

Discography (selection)

Giancarlo Monsalve as Don Carlo, Lisboa 2011

Performance recordings (selection)

Web links

Commons : Don Carlos (Verdi)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Giuseppe Verdi - Don Carlos. Information on CD Naxos 8.660096-98 , accessed April 7, 2018.
  2. ^ A b Rudolf Fath: Reclam's opera guide . 38th edition. Reclam, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-15-010638-9 , pp. 463 .
  3. ^ Mathias Spohr : Don Carlos / Don Carlo. In: Piper's Encyclopedia of Musical Theater. Volume 6: Works. Spontini - Zumsteeg. Piper, Munich / Zurich 1997, ISBN 3-492-02421-1 , p. 471.
  4. ↑ In the opera guides of Harenberg and Reclam, Marie-Joseph Chénier's play Philippe II is incorrectly attributed to his brother André Chénier .
  5. ↑ Alfred Beaujean, Michael Venhoff (ed.): Harenberg: Kulturführer Oper . 5th, completely revised edition. Meyers Lexikonverlag, Mannheim 2006, 1st edition appeared in 1995 as Harenberg's opera guide . ISBN 978-3-411-76162-3 . Pp. 980-983.
  6. ↑ a b Christoph Schwandt: Verdi - The Biography (updated new edition) . 1st edition. Insel Verlag, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-458-35911-1 , pp. 190 .