classical music, opera, theatre

Verdi: Simon Boccanegra

Hungarian State Opera performances at Müpa Budapest

one interval
Béla Bartók National Concert Hall

Ticket prices


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With Simon Boccanegra, a remarkably intricate and monumental musical drama about family and politics, Giuseppe Verdi whisks the audience back to 14th-century Geneva. The story of the Genovan doge, a work condemning ill-fated political battles and urging amity within the Italian nation has been conquering the world's opera stages since 1881.

The opera is constructed from motifs that Verdi developed even earlier. It includes the themes of the lost child, generational conflict, friendship and betrayal. "Such intimate and delicately crafted music is not only impossible to appraise, one cannot even begin to comprehend it,” gushed one contemporary critic. The road to widespread popularity, however, was a long one. The first version of the libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave, who had previously penned the text for Macbeth, Rigoletto and La traviata. Simon Boccanegra failed almost as badly as La traviata. "I thought I had written something of merit, but apparently I was mistaken,” stated Verdi in a letter following the 1857 Venice première, himself feeling that something was missing from the opera.
Some 20 years passed, before a new librettist wrote a new version with new nuances. Once again collaborating on a long-term basis with the composer, Arrigo Boito (the librettist for Otello and Falstaff), would revise the opera and propel it to sweeping success at its La Scala première in 1881. Although the scoring and tone of the opera remained dark, Verdi did sneak in a little light here and there. In the meantime, he moved away from the use of closed numbers in order to create a modern musical drama comprising more uniform musical material.

Concert performance in Italian, with Hungarian surtitles.

Presented by: Hungarian State Opera
  • Balázs Kocsár
  • Simon Boccanegra
    Alberto Gazale
  • Amelia Grimaldi
    Adrienn Miksch
  • Jacopo Fiesco
    Bálint Szabó
  • Gabriele Adorno
    Szabolcs Brickner
  • Paolo Albiani
    Zoltán Kelemen
  • Pietro
    Marcell Bakonyi
  • Captain of the crossbowmen
    Dániel Roska
  • Amelia's maid
    Beáta Szepessy
  • hungarian surtitles
    Márton Karczag
  • libretto
    Arrigo Boito, Francesco Maria Piave
  • chorus director
    Gábor Csiki

Parking information

We wish to inform you that in the event that Müpa Budapest's underground garage and outdoor car park are operating at full capacity, it is advisable to plan for increased waiting times when you arrive. In order to avoid this, we recommend that you depart for our events in time, so that you you can find the ideal parking spot quickly and smoothly and arrive for our performance in comfort. The Müpa Budapest underground garage gates will be operated by an automatic number plate recognition system. Parking is free of charge for visitors with tickets to any of our paid performances on that given day. The detailed parking policy of Müpa Budapest is available here.

Refreshments – Without the Queue

Thanks to our new catering service at the Átrium Snack Bar, you can forget about waiting in line during intermissions for some refreshments and get your order prepped especially for you by the time the intermission actually starts. Find out more about pre-ordering here.

Safe ticket purchase

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