ABSTRACT
Giuseppe Verdi was content to work with materials ready to hand, developing traditional forms to their highest attainable point of beauty and efficiency. Richard Wagner's influence upon his contemporaries was immeasurably greater than that of Verdi, but whether the actual musical legacy that he bequeathed to the world will be more highly valued by posterity is another and a very different question. Verdi's decisive appearance in the musical world of Italy came at a propitious moment. Verdi was born in 1813 of humble parents in the neighbourhood of Busseto not far from Parma. Verdi's first work, "Oberto, Conte di San Bonifacio," revealed unmistakably those qualities which were destined speedily to lift him to the front rank of operatic composers. The progress of Verdi's musical development was the more gradual, as was natural in the case of a man who worked out his own salvation, so to speak, in terms of music and music alone.
