Giuseppe Verdi: Un Ballo in Maschera

Originally composed for the 1857-58 carnival season of the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, the opera about the assassination of the Swedish King Gustav III was vehemently rejected by the Neapolitan censors even after several revisions. The premiere of Un ballo in maschera therefore did not take place until 17 February 1859 at the Teatro Apollo in Rome – also only after appropriate revisions at the insistence of the papal censors: among other things, the action was shifted from Sweden to colonial North America and not a king, but Riccardo, the governor of Boston, was the murder victim. Nevertheless, the melodrama quickly became an audience success, and to this day Un ballo in maschera is one of Verdi’s most popular operas.

Like many modern performances, this recording follows the Swedish version. The work was first heard at the Haus am Ring in 1870 (the year after it opened), and has since been performed well over 500 times. First-class cast with Pyotr Beczala as Gustav III, Dmitry Hvorostovsky as Renato and Krassimira Stoyanova as Emilia.