focus on the music for Macbeth. (Maffei was already writing a libretto for I masnadieri, which was based on the suggested Schiller play, but it could have been substituted for Macbeth had the baritone not been available.) As a result of various complications, including Verdi's illness, that work was not to receive its premiere until July 1847. Piave's text was based on a prose translation by Carlo Rusconi that had been published in Turin in 1838. Verdi did not encounter Shakespeare's original work until after the first performance of the opera, although he had read Shakespeare in translation for many years, as he noted in an 1865 letter: "He is one of my favorite poets. I have had him in my hands from my earliest youth". Writing to Piave, Verdi made it clear how important this subject was to him: "....This tragedy is one of the greatest creations of man... If we can't make something great out of it let us at least try to do something out of the ordinary". In spite of disagreements and Verdi's need to constantly bully Piave into correcting his drafts (to the point where Maffei had a hand in re-writing some scenes of the libretto, especially the witches' chorus in Act 3 and the sleepwalking scene), their version follows Shakespeare's play quite closely, but with some changes. Instead of using three witches as in the play, there is a large female chorus of witches, singing in three-part harmony (they are divided in three groups, and every group sings as a single witch, using "I" and not "we"). The last act begins with an assembly of refugees on the English border, and, in the revised version, ends with a chorus of bards celebrating victory over the tyrant. 1865 revised version for Paris As early as 1852 Verdi was asked by Paris to revise his existing Macbeth in that city. However, nothing transpired but, again in 1864, Verdi was asked to provide additional music - a ballet and a final chorus - for a production planned at the Théâtre Lyrique (Théâtre-Lyrique Impérial du Châtelet) in Paris. In a letter to his publisher, Giulio Ricordi, asking for a copy of the score, Verdi stated that "I would like to lengthen several pieces to give the opera more character", but he quickly realized that the proposed additions would not be sufficient and that an overhaul of the entire