La traviata and work with the composer. One subject was chosen, Piave set to work, and then Verdi threw in another idea, which may have been "La traviata". However, within a short time, a synopsis was dispatched to Venice under the title of "Amore e morte" ("Love and Death"). However, as Budden reveals, Verdi writes to his friend De Sanctis telling him that "for Venice I'm doing "La Dame aux camélias" which will probably be called "La traviata". A subject for our own age." Although still bogged down at Sant'Agata, Piave was sanguine: "Everything will turn out fine, and we'll have a
La descente d'Orphée aux enfers the myth of Orpheus as told by Ovid in Book 10 of the "Metamorphoses". It is debatable whether the opera as it survives in the manuscript is complete or not. The musicologist H. Wiley Hitchcock believes Charpentier may have planned (and composed) a third, concluding act. The opera is not to be confused with an earlier work by Charpentier, "Orphée descendant aux enfers", which is a cantata for three male voices. Orphée (Orpheus) is celebrating his marriage to Euridice (Eurydice) in a beautiful, pastoral landscape. Euridice and her nymph companions gather flowers, but Euridice steps on a snake, is stung