Ernani is an operatic dramma lirico in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, based on the 1830 play Hernani by Victor Hugo. Verdi was commissioned by the Teatro La Fenice in Venice to write an opera, but finding the right subject took some time, and the composer worked with the inexperienced Piave in shaping first one and then another drama by Hugo into an acceptable libretto. As musicologist Roger Parker notes, the composer "intervened on several important points, insisting for example that the role of Ernani be sung by a tenor (rather than by a contralto as had originally been planned)". Ernani was first performed on 9 March 1844, and it was "immensely popular, and was revived countless times during its early years". It became Verdi's most popular opera until it was superseded by Il trovatore after 1853. In 1904, it became the first opera to be recorded completely. Composition history Following the success of both Nabucco and I Lombardi, Verdi was approached by many opera companies wanting to commission him to write an opera for their houses. Rather than prepare another for La Scala, he was interested in a commission for two operas for the 1843–44 season (one of which would be I Lombardi) which came from the President of the Teatro la Fenice in Venice, Marquis Nanni Mocenigo. However, the composer was only willing to accept the terms which he proposed: 12,000 Austrian lire to be paid after the first performance, not the third as proposed by Venice (Verdi recalled what had happened to Un giorno di regno with its one and only performance). Amongst other stipulations, he demanded the right to choose his own subject, his own librettist, and also to pay him directly, as well as refusing to accept the requirement that a full orchestral score be available in advance. In addition, he had the right to choose the singers from the assembled company for that season. David Kimbell notes one additional demand: He explains [to Mocenigo at La Fenice]—and this was rare at the time—that he began to compose only when the libretto was completed to his satisfaction because "when I have a general conception of the whole poem, the music comes of its own accord" Once this agreement was settled upon, the next step was to choose a subject, something which took some time. Several subjects came