Following up on last April’s wildly successful Verdi-themed presentation, August Ventura returns to the Coffee House with a different but no less fascinating multi-media talk that explores Verdi’s enduring legacy of “music, charity, patriotism, honor, grace, and reason”.

Accessible to the opera newcomer as well as enriching for the aficionado, Ventura’s approach will explore aspects of Verdi — both the artist and the humanitarian — as indispensable during Italy’s Risorgimento period and how they prevail to the present day as “a mighty force for continuing good”, an argument that will be illustrated by an intriguing array of filmed content drawn from a wide variety of sources.

The presentation will explore how contemporary-seeming themes of immigration, authoritarianism, religious fanaticism, female empowerment and national identity are depicted in Verdi’s operas, which serve as a distant mirror to understanding our own times.