Five fast Falstaff facts!

1.    Falstaff is adapted from Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor and scenes from Henry IV. Verdi wrote two other operas based on Shakespeare plays – Macbeth and Otello.

2.    Falstaff was the last opera written by Verdi when he was 80 years old.

3.    Out of Verdi’s 26 operas – only 2, including Falstaff, were comedies.

4.    Another operatic version of Falstaff was written before Verdi’s opera, by the Viennese classical composer Antonio Salieri (1750-1825).

5.    Elgar composed an orchestral work titled Falstaff – Symphonic Study based on the character of Falstaff.