Australian Bicentenary Australian Bicentenary The bicentenary of Australia was celebrated in 1988. It marked 200 years since the arrival of the First Fleet of British convict ships at Sydney in 1788. The bicentennial year marked Captain Arthur Phillip's arrival with the 11 ships of the First Fleet in Sydney Harbour in 1788, and the founding of the city of Sydney and the colony of New South Wales. 1988 is considered the official bicentenary year of the founding of Australia. The Australian Bicentenary was marked by pomp and ceremony across Australia to mark the anniversary of the arrival of the First Fleet of
Giuseppe Verdi "Dell'invito trascorsa e gia l'ora" from the start of "La traviata". The bicentenary of Verdi's birth in 2013 was celebrated in numerous events around the world, both in performances and broadcasts. In recent years historians have vigorously debated how political Verdi's operas were. In particular, the "Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves" (known as "Va, pensiero") from the third act of the opera "Nabucco" was intended to be an anthem for Italian patriots, who were seeking to unify their country and free it from foreign control in the years up to 1861 (the chorus's theme of exiles singing about their homeland,