DESCRIPTION:
Giuseppe Verdi.
L' ESULE.
This song, whose title translates as "The Exile'', is set to a poem by Temistocle Solera. The piano begins with a triplet-driven introduction that sets a mood of mild sadness and happier recollection. The singer comes in with a recitative that contrasts the beauty of the moonlight and breezes on the lake to his misery at being in exile from his homeland. The accompaniment punctuates the recitatives with the triplet-driven material that informed the beginning.
The vocal part becomes clearly metric as the singer recollects happier times in a rather sad tune aria, and the declamation and accompaniment become more passionate as he expresses a longing for death to liberate him from exile and return him to his native shores. The last two verses, expressing his dreaming of this eventual transport, are sung twice, and the conclusion of the cabaletta is emphatically triumphant with a slight hint of sorrow creeping in.

Konstantinos Paliatsaras tenor.
Peter Yiang piano.
Recorded in Athens 2012.