When Silva discovers Elvira alone with both Ernani and the king, his reveals his sadness and disappointment in a majestically beautiful aria that every bass and bass-baritone longs to sing. Elvira's aria is one of the most spectacular showpieces Verdi ever gave a leading lady. The thrills begin with the very first scene, where Ernani introduces himself in music that bursts with heroic-tenor machismo. In Ernani you can expect the beauty and emotion we all crave in Italian opera. She returns his love, but they've got serious problems: the king loves Elvira, too, and her much older uncle, Silva, is actually planning to marry her himself! The intrigue continues through each of the opera's four acts, pitting strong-willed men against each other in their desire for the same woman. Ernani's planning to abduct Elvira, the woman he loves. The story unfolds in 16th-century Spain, where Ernani, a wronged nobleman, is an outlaw bent on revenge after the king, Carlo, murders Ernani's father. Based on a play by the king of 19th-century French literature, Victor Hugo, Ernani brings us not a love triangle but a quadrangle.

1844 verdi opera