The world-renowned musician Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is the youngest child of Leopold Mozart. According to Classics Online (2008), Mozart was born in Salzburg, Austria in 1756, the same year that his father became famous for playing the violin.
Mozart as a child showed talent both as a keyboard-player and violinist, although he later focused on composing. He traveled to Paris and London between 1763 and 1766, after which a few more journeys followed, with important operatic commissions happening in Italy between 1771 and 1773. (Classics Online, 2008).
During these periods, however, there was a lack of opportunity and appreciation for Mozart’s gifts in his hometown. Moreover, even places like Munich, Mannheim, and Paris were not able to give him additional employment opportunities.
It was only in 1779 when he was able to work again as court organist in Salzburg, only to be dismissed after commissioning the opera Idomeneo in Munich for the Elector of Bavaria.
After such incidents, he spent the last ten years of his life in Vienna with no financial security whatsoever, made graver by his marriage. The year 1791 apparently brought good things for him. In late November, however, he became seriously ill and died.
Mozart as an Operatic Composer
Mozart was essentially an operatic composer, although Salzburg offered him no real opportunity to exercise his talents in this direction (Classics Online, 2008).
His greater stage works started with Idomeneo in 1781. It was in Vienna that his first success came with the German opera or singspiel Die Entführung aus dem Serail (The Abduction from the Seraglio).
Le Nozze di Figaro
According to Nemirova (2006), Le Nozze di Figaro is a piece about love wherein all the characters are either in love or are looking for love. But each of them has a very different idea of what love means, most especially the men.
Driven by their desire, they try to bridge the gap between dream and reality – and are drawn deeper and deeper into a whirlwind of confusing emotions. (Nemirova, 2006) While it is based on Pierre Beaumarchais’s play La Folle journée ou Le marriage de Figaro which caused a scandal at its 1784 Paris premiere, it has been considered to be the greatest operatic comedy ever written.
It is the story of a servant who rebels against his master, emphasizing the mockery of the nobility, putting into perspective the deconstruction of nobles, not their glorification. Nemirova (2006) said that such opera speaks for openness or even enlightenment because it questioned the allegedly “God-given structure of society.”
Moreover, she stressed that more than anything else, Le Nozze di Figaro is a comedy about love that has “a serious touch.” She reasoned that this is because it deals not only with the beautiful aspects of this emotion, but also with its more unpleasant sides such as hurt, pain, jealousy, rejection, and infidelity. (Nemirova, 2006)
Characters, even the males, actually would seem to have found a “peaceful harmony” during Mozart’s sublime finale when the Count begs his wife for forgiveness even if it things would be resolved only temporarily. Moreover, the events that would lead up to that final happy moment would be an “ever-increasing emotional chaos” as described by the director.
As such, all characters in Figaro, male or female, would show a human’s “uncontrollable desire for love.” It is embodied in the male philanderer and the wild male woman magnet and the female that is conflicted between security and passionate love.
Theirs is a utopia of perfect fulfillment and bliss. (Nemirova, 2006).
Cosi Fan Tutte
According to Asiado (2007), Cosi fan Tutte is a comic opera with an unusual title. This is because cosi means “in this way” or “like this,” fan means “do” and Tutte is the Italian feminine version for all – making it subject to interpretation as “In this way do all (women),” “Like this do all (women),” or even “Women are all alike.”
After a long time, it has been known to be a farce and a fun opera that the genius Mozart wrote great music for.
Asiado (2007) said the story of the male character Don Alfonso, an old cynical philosopher who made a bet with his friends Ferrando and Guglielmo that their fiancées, the sisters Dorabella and Firodiligi, cannot stay faithful. This is turn, shows the distrust that men have put into the female image.
Meanwhile, the two accepted the challenge and greedily planned on how to use their possible winnings.
As such for men who are supposedly called to war, Ferrando and Guglielmo were both forced to bid their goodbyes to their fiancées. This, of course, they did in the hopes that of a normal man that they will not be forgotten nor betrayed.
Grieving for the departure of their beloved, Dorabella and Firodiligi are advised by their ladies maid Despina to just enjoy themselves. Just like all evil plans, there is a brain behind it, this time in the name of Don Alfonso.
To test their theory of female betrayal, Ferrando and Guglielmo disguised themselves as Albanian princes and declare their adoration for the sisters, only to outrage them. This, in turn, makes the two male friends very happy, saying that the “power of love” is for certain.
As the devious plans continue for the wager of the frail male ego, the sisters are made to believe that the two Albanians were sick. While trying to help them supposedly recover, they try to keep their distance, a fact that made the men very happy.
However, after being convinced by Despina to enjoy the attention from the suitors, the sisters entertain the two male friends, unknowingly switching the true partners. After some wooing and persuasion, both of the women seem to have given in to the advances of the two, only to the resentment of the perpetrators.
Despite the men cursing the alleged ingratitude of women, Don Alfonso advises the angry men to still marry the women and accept that all women are alike: Così fan Tutte, as widely believed by men back then.
Moreover, after the deception was revealed, everything seemed to have been forgotten and forgiven.
Don Giovanni
Meanwhile, Music with Ease said that Don Giovanni was presented for the first time in Prague.
As such, Mozart directed the rehearsals to this opera himself, bringing the singers to his own house to study to advise them how to execute some passages. Also, he even asked the artists to show some Italian spontaneity that would go very well with his melodies.
The story exemplifies the male during old times who has a flair for the dramatic, the exciting, and the worthwhile.
At the start of the opera, a masked Don Giovanni initially runs off with the Commendatore’s daughter Donna Anna. Having such an incident, a duel was incited by the Commendatore to settle things once and for all, only to result in his death. In the spirit of vengeance and male pride, Donna Anna and her brother, Don Ottavio swear to get revenge from the masked killer of the Commendatore.
On the other hand, Don Giovanni is displayed as the typical womanizer and player who treats women as conquests, just like the many philandering males portrayed in many literary works.
Having been entangled in more dangerous affairs, Don Giovanni tries to weasel himself out of apparently seducing a betrothed woman, playing with another, and killing the Commendatore.
However, no matter the clever reasons given, Donna Anna recognized Giovanni’s voice as the same as her father’s murderer. Also, the betrothed of Zerlina, the woman whom Giovanni lusted after, chastised her for almost giving in to the player’s advances, in the end gaining his forgiveness.
After which, Giovanni invited the couple and a masked trio into his residence, only to be faced with the three who are chasing him for vengeance. And as for all men faced with such a dilemma, it is only natural to turn to someone else for help, namely to Leporello.
Fleeing chase after chase, Giovanni escapes each and every attempt by the people he has sinned against. He repeatedly disguised himself so that he wouldn’t take the fall for his wrongdoings.
In the end, he meets his end, with no indication whatsoever that he ever was sorry for the things that he did.
For all
I think Mozart’s operas are very indicative of how men are, whether in the past or the present. In his works, men have been depicted to be philanderers, womanizers, users, merciless killers, untrusting beings, and even avenging people. But, whatever time or place they are put in, their pride, jealousy, passion, eagerness, wildness, power, and presence will prove to be unchanging, whatever the times maybe.
Moreover, it’s not a question of what influenced what (in terms of the opera or the times) but how close the depiction is to reality and how people can relate to it.
Bibliography
- Asiado, T. (2007) Mozart Opera Cosi fan tutte. Suite 101.
- Don Giovanni (Mozart) – Synopsis. Music with Ease. Web.
- Nemirova, V. (2006) Le Nozze di Figaro.
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (2008) Classics Online.