page_title: Don Carlos
section_title: Composition history
hierarchical_section_title: Don Carlos / Composition history
caption_attribution_description: Italiano: Fotografia di Giuseppe Verdi. English: Picture of Giuseppe Verdi. Français&#160;: Photo de Giuseppe Verdi.
context_page_description: Don Carlos is a five-act grand opera composed by Giuseppe Verdi to a French-language libretto by Joseph Méry and Camille du Locle, based on the dramatic play Don Carlos, Infant von Spanien by Friedrich Schiller. In addition, it has been noted by David Kimball that the Forest of Fontainebleau scene and auto-da-fé were the most substantial of several incidents borrowed from a contemporary play on Philip II by Eugène Cormon". The opera is most often performed in Italian translation, usually under the title Don Carlo.
  The opera's story is based on conflicts in the life of Carlos, Prince of Asturias. Though he was betrothed to Elisabeth of Valois, part of the peace treaty ending the Italian War of 1551–59 between the Houses of Habsburg and Valois demanded that she be married instead to his father Philip II of Spain. It was commissioned and produced by the Théâtre Impérial de l'Opéra and given its premiere at the Salle Le Peletier on 11 March 1867.
  The first performance in Italian was given at Covent Garden in London in June 1867. The first Italian version given in Italy was in Bologna in October 1867. Revised again by Verdi, it was given in Naples in November/December 1872.
context_section_description: Pre-première cuts and first published edition
  Verdi made a number of cuts in 1866, after finishing the opera but before composing the ballet, simply because the work was becoming too long. These were a duet for Elisabeth and Eboli in Act 4, Scene 1; a duet for Carlos and the King after the death of Posa in Act 4, Scene 2; and an exchange between Elisabeth and Eboli during the insurrection in the same scene.
  After the ballet had been composed, it emerged during the 1867 rehearsal period that, without further cuts, the opera would not finish before midnight (the time by which patrons would need to leave in order to catch the last trains to the Paris suburbs). Verdi then authorised some further cuts, which were, firstly, the introduction to Act 1 (with a chorus of woodcutters and their wives, and including the first appearance of Elisabeth); secondly, a short entry solo for Posa (J'étais en Flandres) in Act 2, Scene 1; and, thirdly, part of the dialogue between the King and Posa at the end of Act 2, Scene 2.
  The opera, as first published at the time of the première, consisted of Verdi's original conception, without all of the above-named cuts, but including the ballet.
caption: Giuseppe Verdi, about 1870
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