SKU: HL.50601627
The Works of Giuseppe Verdi is the first critical edition of the composer's oeuvre. Together with his operas, the series offers his songs, choral music and sacred pieces, and string quartet and other instrumental works. This edition of Rigoletto is based on Verdi's autograph score and an array of additional sources, including contemporary manuscript copies, early editions, and performing parts. It also takes into consideration the abbozzo published in facsimile in 1941, an autograph manuscript containing sketch fragments and a complete continuity draft of the opera. The edition identifies and resolves numerous ambiguities of harmony, melodic detail, text, and phrasing that have marred previous scores. In addition, it reinstates theoriginal reading of several lines of the libretto, which had been censored prior to the opera's first performance in Venice in 1851.Martin Chusid's extensive introduction and critical commentary to the score discuss this and other matters of censorship and shed light on the genesis, sources, and performance history of Rigoletto.
