Giuseppe Verdi

Giuseppe Verdi came from Le Roncole, a small village in northern Italy, where he was born in 1813, the son of an innkeeper. Opera was Italy's popular entertainment, and for half a century he supplied it: from the breakthrough of Nabucco in 1842 to Falstaff, finished in his late seventies, his operas filled theaters and his tunes were sung in the streets.

He wrote about people under pressure, fathers and daughters, jealousy, sacrifice, power, with melodies that go straight in. Success made him wealthy, and he spent much of it on his farm at Sant'Agata and on founding a retirement home for musicians in Milan, the Casa di Riposo, which he called his finest work. He is buried there. He died in Milan in 1901, mourned by enormous crowds.

Start with La traviata, the story of a Parisian courtesan who gives up the man she loves. Then go bigger with Aida, set in ancient Egypt.