![]() ![]() Incorporating a discussion of the dramaturgical thinking of the late Enlightenment and the difficult moral problems that the opera raises, this is an important study for scholars and researchers from opera studies, theatre and performance studies, music history as well as conductors, directors and singers. The book confronts Bassi’s portrayal with a study of the opera’s early German reception and performance history, demonstrating how Don Giovanni as we know it today was not only created by Mozart, Da Ponte and Luigi Bassi but also by the early German adapters, translators, critics and performers who turned the title character into the arrogant and violent villain we still encounter in most of today’s stage productions. Although Bassi was coached in the role by the composer himself, his portrayal has never been studied in depth before, and this book presents a large number of new sources (first- and second-hand accounts), which allows us to reconstruct his performance scene by scene. The Original Portrayal of Mozart’s Don Giovanni offers an original reading of Mozart’s and Da Ponte’s opera Don Giovanni, using as a lens the portrayal of the title role by its creator, the baritone Luigi Bassi (1766–1825). My introduction also looks at the early reception of the opera, and Mozart’s revisions for the first Viennese revival in 1789–1791. ![]() The original orchestral parts and performance score from the first production show that revisions to the opera continued during the rehearsal period, and perhaps even after the premiere. When that possibility failed to materialize, Mozart turned his attention to other projects for a few months, then finished the rest of Figaro within a period of just a few weeks before its premiere on. Mozart completed much of the work on the first two acts by November 1785, apparently with a view toward a premiere by the end of that year or the beginning of 1786. It appears that the opera was composed in two main stages. A close analysis of the paper-types in the autograph, in conjunction with a reassessment of the primary documentary evidence, strongly suggests that Mozart began to compose the opera in the summer or even the late spring of 1785, much earlier than previously thought. The introduction begins by examining the compositional genesis of the opera. An introduction to the color facsimile of Mozart’s autograph of "Le nozze di Figaro" published by the Packard Humanities Institute and Bärenreiter in 2007. ![]()
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