My experience with Mozart is not far deeper than your average person’s. I have the advantage of having had listened to several of his symphonies and piano concertos several times, in the way back time when we used to listen to CDs. While I am confident in saying that I listen to a lot more classical music then the average person walking the street, my knowledge of Mozart is rather typical, mostly I know his music from compilations of his most famous works performed by various orchestras. I am not knowledgeable enough to inform any of you of some underappreciated masterpiece by the grand master Mozart. However, I am knowledgeable enough to fool the average person into believing I know what I am talking about, so let us see how I do.
One of my favorite single songs of Mozart’s is his overture for “The Marriage of Figaro.” To the best of my experience, this song is among Mozart’s most bombastic. Every leaping sound is alive with joy. It is fun, and an easy song for casuals like me to fall in love with. This is a song everyone knows to some degree as it has been used in countless movies, commercials and elsewhere.
As a random person writing a music blog, I have always felt it was my obligation to watch the opera “The Marriage of Figaro.” It is the least I can do right? I owe at least that much to Mozart. To date I have watched three different recorded versions of the opera, because I take my obligations seriously, this is my tale.
In my younger years I did not know that “The Marriage of Figaro” was an opera; I would have guessed as much, but part of my brain way back when thought maybe the overture was for one of Mozart’s symphonies, I did not know the name of number of. Not only is “The Marriage of Figaro” an opera; it is also a sequel.
“The Barber of Seville or the Useless Precaution” is a comedy play conceived as an opera with music created by Antoine-Laurent Baudron. A quick synopsis of the story is, The Count (sometimes names Almaviva” falls in love at first sight with Rosine, however her guardian, Doctor Bartolo, keeps her locked up in his house, with every intention of marrying her himself. Our protagonist Figaro, a former associate of The Count’s is working as a barber and he is motivated by money and friendship to help The Count. This is a happy play with a happy ending, with the aid of Figaro our star-crossed lovers marry.
Roughly ten years later Mozart was commissioned to write the music for the sequel “The Marriage of Figaro.” The shirt in the story is now about the complications Figaro must face as he and his love Susanna plan their own marriage. Seeking “sweet revenge” Dr. Bartolo interferes in every way he can think of and tragically our romantic Count is also a villain how who is attempted to invoke “droit du seigneur” (Law of the Lord); whereby the lord can bed any serving girl on her wedding night. A complicated and humour game is played by all the parties involved. We are once again met with a happy ending.
Incredibly there is a third opera, “The Guilty Mother.” This third play never received the same acclaim as the first two and has rarely been performed since it is initial inception. I do not envy Darius and Madeleine Milhaud, as they are the composures who had to follow Mozart.
All three of these operas were initially written as plays by Pieree Beaumarchais. Things get even more complicated as the characters, Figaro and company, were wildly popular. I do not understand it in full, but licence agreements prevented Beaumarchais from developing and releasing his plans as he planned them, and other playwrights were allowed to right their own sequels to “The Barber of Seville” and “The Marriage of Figaro” which means there is more a mythology to Figaro and friends then there is a continuity. What I just described feels like a very modern problem, but this all happened in the late eighteenth century. I guess copyrights and ownership of fictional works and characters has always been a challenging legal issue.
It is a little funny that the second installment of this trilogy is so much more famous than the rest of it, but we obviously have Mozart to thank for that.
The opera “The Mirage of Figaro” is approximately three hours in length, and while charming and humours, and full of fun moments and songs, the overture is the crown jewel. There is a reason why everyone knows the overture but not everyone knows the opera. I am not the biggest fan of opera, so my taste is skewed in the direction of Mozart’s symphonies, but that overture, well there is a reason why my younger less informed mind imagined entire movements following it. This is not to say I am disappointed. I like the opera enough to have watched it three different times. I am now watching an Irish production of “The Barber of Seville” because this trilogy of plays is fascinating to me now that I have forced myself to learn all of this.
Sometimes on this blog I present an introduction to music most people may not be familiar with. Sometimes I pull on a string and huge story unfolds before me as I write. Sometimes I ramble on about something everyone already knows. This time I think it is a string. I had no idea how much history and story were involved with “The Marriage of Figaro” I just believe it was a fun play Mozart did the music for. On this blog I have let slip numerous times my fondness of story telling in all its mediums, and I sense that “The Marriage of Figaro” is becoming my personal first exploration of a mythology from an opera, and that is something to be very excited about.
It is also worthwhile to listen to the classics and by deciding to showcase “The Marriage of Figaro” overture, I have given myself so much more motivation to keep pulling that string.
Until next year, keep on rocking in the free world.
- King of Braves
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