page_title: Otello
section_title: From libretto to first performance: 1879 to 1887
hierarchical_section_title: Otello / Composition history / From libretto to first performance: 1879 to 1887
caption_attribution_description: English: Victor Maurel-baritone-as Iago
context_page_description: Otello is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Arrigo Boito, based on Shakespeare's play Othello. It was Verdi's penultimate opera, and was first performed at the Teatro alla Scala, Milan, on 5 February 1887.
  The composer was reluctant to write anything new after the success of Aida in 1871, and he retreated into retirement. It took his Milan publisher Giulio Ricordi the next ten years, first to encourage the revision of Verdi's 1857 Simon Boccanegra by introducing Boito as librettist, and then to begin the arduous process of persuading and cajoling Verdi to see Boito's completed libretto for Otello in July/August 1881. However, the process of writing the first drafts of the libretto and the years of their revision, with Verdi all along not promising anything, dragged on. It wasn't until 1884, five years after the first drafts of the libretto, that composition began, with most of the work finishing in late 1885. When it finally premiered in Milan on 5 February 1887, it proved to be a resounding success, and further stagings of Otello soon followed at leading theatres throughout Europe and America.
context_section_description: The process of writing the first drafts of the libretto and the years of their revision, with Verdi all along not promising anything, dragged on.  As Walker charts it, the opera was completed:
  in three comparatively short bouts of composition: the first, very brief, was at Genoa in March 1884 [five years after the first drafts of the libretto began!]; the second, the principal one, at Genoa from December 1884 to April 1885; the third at Sant' Agata from the middle of September to early October 1885.
  By late August 1881, it appears that the text of the finale of act 3, over which there had been some considerable discussion (with ideas exchanged between both men) was sent to Verdi, who responded in a long letter from Milan regarding his feelings about its overall structure, the role of the chorus, and other issues. Throughout 1882 and 1883 very little happened, although during the winter of 1883 Verdi and Boito met in Genoa where the Verdis spent their winters, but it prompted Ricordi for three Christmases in a row to send a cake to Verdi with the figure of the Moor—in chocolate—on the top. In order to keep information about the composition within the group, this gesture may have been the cause for the name given to the project for many years, "chocolate", as in Boito's letter of 1864 noting that "the manufacture of chocolate was going ahead".
  Early the following year, Verdi began to compose and on 20 March 1884, in a letter from Boito to Ricordi, the librettist announced that Verdi had begun with the "opening of first act and seems to be working with fervor". There then occurred an event which unsettled both Verdi and Boito, and which nearly caused the project to come to a complete stop.  While attending a banquet in Naples following the successful presentation of his opera Mefistofele, Boito gave an interview to a journalist and, in trying to keep information about the proposed Otello as quiet as possible, appears to have been misquoted by another journalist who overheard part of the conversation.  The key point was that Boito, himself a composer, appeared to want to compose the music for Otello himself.  When Verdi read this in a Milan newspaper, he was horrified and, in a letter to Faccio (rather than directly confronting Boito) stated that he wanted Faccio to directly tell the librettist that "I will give him his manuscript intact, without a shadow of resentment, without rancor of any kind".
  When he heard of the newspaper report, Boito was horrified. Writing immediately to Verdi, he states:
  The theme and my libretto are yours by right of conquest.  You alone can set Othello to music—all the dramatic creations you have given us proclaim the truth.
  [He continues by discussing his own preoccupation with Emperor Nero and his love for the period of Ancient Roman history, pointing to his ongoing work on his own opera, Nerone]
  [...] no other subject in the world can distract me, not even Shakespeare's Othello, could distract me from my theme.
  [He asks the composer, given the above comments, whether he really believes that he would accept his offer. Boito begs Verdi to not to abandon Otello:] It is predestined for you.  Create it.  You had begun work upon it [so..] take up you pen again and write me soon: 'Dear Boito, do me the favour of altering these verses, etc. etc.....' 
  Verdi's response, which came right away was quite blunt: in addition to complaining of his age, his years of service, and raising other objections, he states: "The conclusion is that all this has cast a chill over this Otello, and stiffened the hand that had begun to trace out a few bars!", but, in total contrast, Boito appears to have simply decided to carry on. Albeit "somewhat disquieted", he immediately proposes "a sort of evil Credo [which] I did... for my own comfort and personal satisfaction, because I felt the need of doing it". On 3 May, Verdi wrote back, calming this down: "Most beautiful this Credo; most powerful and wholly Shakespearian....[...] it would be well to leave this Otello in peace for a bit....[and encouraging Boito to come to Sant
caption: Baritone Victor Maurel, the first Iago
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