Verdi's Opera Aida

We continue our classical broadcasts, with Arabic commentary upon them, from this station at half past seven every Wednesday evening; tonight we present part of Verdi's famous opera Aida. It is in four acts, composed expressly for the opening ceremony of the Opera in Cairo in 1871; the Khedive Ismail Pasha had commissioned it from Verdi for an honorary fee of one hundred and fifty thousand francs.

Aida is the daughter of the King of Abyssinia, and had been taken captive to Egypt together with her father. During her stay there, attending Amneris, the daughter of the King of Egypt, she fell in love with Radames, the captain of the guards, whom Amneris, the King's daughter, loved as well.

The Emperor of Abyssinia seizes this opportunity and asks his daughter to distract the captain of the guards from his duties by means of her love; she does so, and succeeds. Radames becomes a traitor to his country and a helper of its enemy, the Emperor of Abyssinia. But the plot is discovered, and in vain does Amneris, the King's daughter, try to save him, despite the jealousy that inflamed her heart. The captain of the guards is placed in a pit beneath the earth — his tomb until he dies.

Aida anticipates events, and sings with her lover a salute to liberating death, while we hear the multitudes in the nearby temple chanting the divine hymns.

It is enough to know this story to imagine what, with a musician like Verdi, may accompany it: depth of feeling, anxiety, and a beautiful legendary atmosphere, all tinged with a splendid Eastern coloring.