Verdi’s “Nabucco” at the Berlin State Opera with Anna Netrebko as Abigaille

Fly, thought, on golden wings” – “Va pensiero, sull’ali dorate” – the captured Hebrews plead in the third act of the opera “Nabucco”, it is Giuseppe Verdi’s most popular melody. At the Milan premiere of the opera, the story of the fateful struggle between two peoples and cultures in biblical times, he was just 28 years old and had experienced terrible things – the death of both children and the young wife. Plus the enormous failure of his second opera. Now he composed this “Prisoner’s Choir”, the song of the Hebrew refugees on the banks of the Euphrates in the hope of returning home: “Oh, mia patria si bella e perduta” – “Oh, my fatherland so beautiful and lost!” To this day what feels like the other national anthem of the Italians. Verdi’s dream of unifying his torn country? And what does Anna Netrebko feel here?