Verdi soon stumbled upon Victor Hugo's five-act play Le roi s'amuse. He then asked Francesco Maria Piave (with whom he had already created Ernani, I due Foscari, Macbeth, Il Corsaro and Stiffelio) to examine the play Kean by Alexandre Dumas, père, but he felt he needed a more energetic subject to work on. By this time he was already a well-known composer and had a degree of freedom in choosing the works he would prefer to set to music. Verdi was commissioned to write a new opera by the La Fenice opera house in Venice in 1850.

The curse comes to fruition when Gilda likewise falls in love with the Duke and eventually sacrifices her life to save him from the assassins hired by her father.įrancesco Maria Piave, the librettist of Rigoletto The opera's original title, La maledizione (The Curse), refers to the curse placed on both the Duke and Rigoletto by a courtier whose daughter had been seduced by the Duke with Rigoletto's encouragement. Its tragic story revolves around the licentious Duke of Mantua, his hunch-backed court jester Rigoletto and Rigoletto's beautiful daughter Gilda. It is considered by many to be the first of the operatic masterpieces of Verdi's middle-to-late career. Despite serious initial problems with the Austrian censors who had control over northern Italian theatres at the time, the opera had a triumphant premiere at La Fenice in Venice on 11 March 1851. The Italian libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave based on the play Le roi s'amuse by Victor Hugo. Rigoletto ( pronounced ) is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi.

Verdi opera originally titled the curse