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The buffa aria in Mozart's Vienna

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2008

John Platoff
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Extract

Like the modern romance novel or murder mystery, late-eighteenth-century opera buffa is a thoroughly conventional genre. Standard plot devices, stock characters and vocal types, and particular kinds of musical number appear again and again, and any reasonably comprehensive understanding of the genre requires that we recognise these familiar patterns in text and music. This is especially important in the case of Mozart, who lies at the heart of our interest in the repertory: while his operas are routinely praised for their uniqueness and originality, we can evaluate these claims only by addressing the formal and stylistic procedures that served as his immediate context.

Type
Research Article
Information
Cambridge Opera Journal , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , July 1990 , pp. 99 - 120
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

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References

1 I am grateful to the National Endowment for the Humanities for research support, and to Wye Allanbrook, Mary Hunter and James Webster for many valuable suggestions.

2 See, for example, Robinson, Michael F., ‘Mozart and the Opera Buffa Tradition’, in Tim Carter, W. A. Mozart: ‘Le nozze di Figaro’, Cambridge Opera Handbooks (Cambridge, 1987), 13–14 and 23–4.Google Scholar

3 The rondò is a showpiece aria in two tempos (slow–fast), in which the main theme of each section returns at least once. See Heartz, Daniel, ‘Mozart and his Italian Contemporaries: La clemenza di Tito’, Mozart-Jahrbuch (1978–1979), 281–3.Google Scholar

4 There were approximately seventy-five opere buffe performed in Vienna during the 1780s, and about twenty of them were written between Mozart's arrival there in 1781 and the première of Così fan tutte in 1790. For a list of the latter group seeGoogle ScholarPlatoff, John, ‘Musical and Dramatic Structure in the Opera Buffa Finale’, Journal of Musicology, 7 (1989), 230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5 Heartz (see n. 3), 280.

6 The concept of a ‘sonata principle’ was first discussed by Cone, Edward T., in Musical Form and Musical Performance (New York, 1968), 76–7.Google Scholar

7 We find the amorous guardian in I1 barbiere di Siviglia (Petrosellini and Paisiello, 1782);Google Scholar the vain father in II re Teodoro in Venezia (Casti and Paisiello, 1784)Google Scholar and Il matrimonio segreto (Bertati and Cimarosa, 1792);Google Scholar the greedy (if affectionate) father in La cifra (Da Ponte and Salieri, 1789);Google Scholar the short-tempered guardian in Il burbero di buon cuore (Da Ponte and Martín y Soler, 1786);Google Scholar and comic philosophers and their students in Il Demogorgone (Da Ponte and Righini, 1786)Google Scholar and Democrito corretto (Brunati and Dittersdorf, 1787).Google Scholar

8 See Joseph II's letter of 29 September 1786, quoted in Michtner, Otto, Das alte Burgtheater als Opernbühne (Vienna, 1970), 227Google Scholar, and more extensively in Heartz, Daniel, ‘Constructing Le nozze di Figaro’, Journal of the Royal Musical Association, 112 (1987), 78–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

9 See Kelly's, Michael report of Benucci singing ‘;Non più andrai’ to the great delight of Mozart (Reminiscences of Michael Kelly [London, 1826]Google Scholar, quoted in Heartz, ‘Le nozze’, 91). For further accounts see Heartz, , ‘Setting the Stage for Figaro’, The Musical Times, 127 (1986), 256–60CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Michtner, 149–51, 158, 240–1 and 302 n. 7.

10 Two representative earlier examples of buffa arias are ‘Non comoda all'amante’, from Goldoni's and Piccinni's La buona figliuola (1760)Google Scholar, and ‘Per esempio: quando viene’, from Coltellini's and Gassmann's La contessina (1770).Google Scholar

11 For example, Mazzolà's and Weigl's Il pazzo per forza (1788).Google Scholar Either Francesco Bussani or Stefano Mandini, both of whom frequently played secondary buffo roles, sang the primo buffo when Benucci did not appear.

12 In Il barbiere, Bartolo's ‘Seghidiglia Spagnuola’. See also ‘Ma piano; adagio andiamo’ from Democrito corretto.

13 The role of Demogorgone may have been written for Benucci. Raeburn, Christopher, ‘An Evening at Schönbrunn’, Music Review, 16 (1955), 109–10Google Scholar, claims that tenor Michael Kelly sang it, referring to a somewhat inconclusive passage in Kelly's Reminiscences; but the part was clearly written for a baritone.

14 For a similar type, see Democrito corretto, which features both the philosopher Democrito and his reluctant disciple Strabone.

15 The differences between these sections are clear once we consider the organisation of Italian lyric verse. The standard line (a verso piano)has its principal accent on the penultimate syllable; versi sdruccioli follow the final accent with two unaccented syllables; versi tronchi end on the accented syllable. This last type normally serves to end stanzas, though tronchi may be used at other points. Syllabic line-lengths are counted in terms of versi piani, so that a tronco line with six syllables, a piano line with seven and a sdrucciolo line with eight would all be examples of settenario (a seven-syllable line). According to this method of counting, the other common line-lengths are quinario (five syllables), senario (six syllables), ottonario (eight syllables), decasillabo (ten syllables) and endecasillabo (eleven syllables). A stanza generally contains four to six lines, with linked rhymes (such as abac or aabcbd), and concludes with a verso tronco. The final tronco lines of subsequent stanzas often rhyme with one another.

16 The letters to the left show the rhyme scheme, versi sdruccioli in italics, versi tronchi in bold.

17 The layout follows the printed libretto (Vienna: Kurzbek [sic], c. 1786), although the metre may actually be quinario doppio, with sdruccioli on the first verse of nearly every pair.

18 Especially in lines such as ‘V'han fra queste contadine, / Cameriere, cittadine, / V'han contesse, baronesse, / Marchesane, principesse’, which rhyme aabb and in which the third line contains an internal rhyme.

19 Carter (see n. 2), 80–1.

20 See, for example, ‘In quegli anni in cui solea’ from Da Ponte's and Martín y Soler's Una cosa rara (1786)Google Scholar, and ‘Ma piano; adagio andiamo’ from Democrito corretto.

21 Unless they have multiple tempos, as discussed later.

22 For a discussion of some stylistic features of seria arias in opera buffa, see Hunter, Mary, ‘Text, Music, and Drama in Haydn's Italian Opera Arias: Four Case Studies’, Journal of Musicology, 7 (1989), 32–8, 42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The term ‘exalted march’ is used by Allanbrook, Wye Jamison, Rhythmic Gesture in Mozart: ‘Le nozze di Figaro’ and ‘Don Giovanni’ (Chicago, 1983), 19Google Scholar and passim, to describe the solemn, almost ecclesiastical style adopted by noble and serious characters in the expression of grand and passionate sentiments, as in Donna Anna's ‘Or sai chi l'onore’.

23 This style is discussed in more detail in Platoff (see n. 4), 199. Not all arias reiterate the rhythmic pattern quite as mechanically as Ex. 1. Lippmann, Friedrich, ‘Mozart and der Vers’, Analecta Musicologica, 18 (1978), 117Google Scholar, notes that Paisiello in particular tends to maintain a single rhythmic pattern for a considerable time.

24 The text is reproduced from the Milan libretto (Gio. Battista Bianchi, c. 1790 [US–Wc: Schatz 9281]), with minor changes from Salieri's autograph score (A–Wn: 16.514).

25 ‘Exposition’ in this context refers to a section that presents musical paragraphs in the tonic and then a contrasting key (virtually always the dominant), with a confirming cadence in that key. It does not imply the presentation of thematic material that will return later in the movement.

26 The term derives from Hunter (see n. 22), 40, who uses it to describe through-composed arias by Haydn ‘in which the tonic make[s] a structural return, but is not accompanied by thematic material from the exposition’. I use the term more broadly here, referring to the second portion of an aria even if the return to the tonic is not highly articulated.

27 Some buffa arias restate in the tonal return section material either from the first or the second group of the exposition, though not from both; a larger number do not restate previous thematic material.

28 For example, ‘Quel che spesso vero appare’ from Brunati's and Storace's Gli sposi malcontent (1785).Google Scholar

29 See ‘Sorger dobbiam dal letto’ from Il Demogorgone, whose text is given on p. 102.

30 Heartz, ‘Le nozze’ (see n. 8), 88–9, points out the resemblances between this aria and ‘Veramente ho torto, è vero’ from Paisiello's Il barbiere (Ex. 1). See also Abert, Hermann, W. A. Mozart: Neubearbeitete and erweiterte Ausgabe von Otto Jahns Mozart, 2 vols., 8th edn (Leipzig, 1973–1975), I, 363Google Scholar, who shows a connection between ‘Aprite un po'’ and an aria from Paisiello's Il re Teodoro.

31 The fact that both composers were writing for Benucci may contribute to the similarities between the patter build-up in bars 57–66 of Mozart's aria and bars 55–65 and 74–81 of ‘L'anno mille settecento’.

32 The same progression also occurs in Figaro's ‘Scorsi già molti paesi’ from Il barbiere.

33 The principles outlined here apply in different ways to other examples, such as Figaro's ‘Se vuoi ballare’ and ‘Non più andrai’ from Act I of Figaro. For a recent analysis of the latter see Webster, James, ‘To Understand Verdi and Wagner We Must Understand Mozart’, 19th-Century Music, 11 (1987–1988), 181.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

34 Rosen, Charles, The Classical Style (New York, 1971), 296;Google Scholar and Carter (see n. 2), 90. See also Kerman, Joseph, Opera as Drama (1956; rev. edn, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1988), 58–63Google Scholar, and Schoffman, Nachum, ‘Vocal Sonata Forms of Mozart’, Current Musicology, 28 (1979), 19–29.Google Scholar

35 Carter, 102–3.

36 Rosen (see n. 34), 295, 296–301.

37 Kerman (seen. 34) uses the trio ‘Ah, taci, ingiusto core’ from Act II of Don Giovanni (63–8); Rosen's principal example is the sextet ‘Riconosci in questo amplesso’ from Act III of Figaro (290–5); Carter relies mainly on ‘Cosa sento! tosto andate’, the Act I trio from Figaro (95–104). For discussions of Idomeneo see Kerman, 82–5, Rosen, 306–7, and Hirshberg, Jehoash, ‘Formal and Dramatic Aspects of Sonata Form in Mozart's Idomeneo’, Music Review, 38 (1977), 192–210.Google Scholar

38 Robinson, in Carter (see n. 2), 24.

39 In an aria or ensemble, it is a triple return if the beginning of the text also returns. See Hunter (n. 22), 34.

40 This formulation of the ‘key-area form’ is discussed in Ratner, Leonard G., Classic Music: Expression, Form, and Style (New York and London, 1980), 209–47.Google Scholar

41 Webster (see n. 33), 179.

42 Abbate, Carolyn, ‘Wagner, “On Modulation”, and Tristan', Cambridge Opera Journal, 1 (1989), 35.Google Scholar Kerman's essay is in Opera as Drama (see n. 34), 158–77.

43 See Webster (n. 33) for a critical survey of analytic approaches to late-eighteenth-century opera.