Verdi's relationship with Shakespeare's theatre unfolds over the course of a long career studded with completed projects, such as Macbeth, Othello and Falstaff and others long pursued but never realized, such as Hamlet, The Tempest, King Lear. The first opportunity to try his hand at a subject by the English playwright came thanks to Alessandro Lanari, impresario of the Teatro della Pergola in Florence, who commissioned the composer to write a new opera for the 1847 Carnival season.

Set in the mists of Scotland, Macbeth is a dark fantasy drama where witches and ghosts are the co-protagonists of the eponymous leader and his wicked wife. The choice of the fantasy genre was rather significant since in the previous years the impresario Lanari had brought operas with romantic subjects to the Florentine stage, such as Meyerbeer's Robert le Diable and von Weber's Der Freischütz. Verdi's new opera therefore seemed to want to throw down the gauntlet to the successes of composers from beyond the Alps.

From the beginning, the composer had very clear ideas about the meaning of his new opera, which traces the downward spiral of the protagonist transformed into a cruel murderer by unbridled ambition. Thirst for power, madness and death mark the fate of Macbeth and his malevolent wife, a woman with a dark soul and the instigator of her husband's horrendous crimes.

New staging
More characters TBD (updated: January 16, 2025)

Poster © Gianluigi Toccafondo