Cosi fan tutte (Mozart)

Description

Mozart and Da Ponte produced 'Così fan tutte' together. The action is the proper fit for a farce: two young men receive a challenge from an old friend to test their fiancees' loyalty. They disguise themselves to seduce the other's girlfriend, assume they will not succeed, and are surprised when they do. In the end, both couples reconcile.

The plot may be formalistic, but Mozart knows how to deal with it and carries the necessary irony in his music. The music is highly melodic, and the delight is often slightly tempered by an undertone of melancholy and disillusionment.

This opera has no real hero: the six roles are all equally important, so more than in any Mozart opera, it comes down to good ensemble work.

In many of Mozart's works, one question recurs: How sincere is the nobleman, or how noble is man? When I heard 'Soave sia il vento' for the first time, I knew I had found my home ground. It is the first opera I ever saw—the opera and the setting were magnificent, namely at Schönbrunn Palace.

 

From Wikipedia:

Così fan tutte, ossia La scuola degli amanti[a] (Women are like that, or The School for Lovers), K. 588, is an opera buffa in two acts by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. It was first performed on 26 January 1790 at the Burgtheater in Vienna, Austria. The libretto was written by Lorenzo Da Ponte, who also wrote Le Nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni.

Although it is commonly held that Così fan tutte was written and composed at the suggestion of Emperor Joseph II, recent research does not support this idea.[2][3] There is evidence that Mozart's contemporary, Antonio Salieri, tried to set the libretto but left it unfinished. In 1994, John Rice uncovered two terzetti by Salieri in the Austrian National Library.[4]

The short title, Così fan tutte, literally means "So do they all," using the feminine plural (tutte) to indicate women. It is usually translated into English as "Women are like that." The three men sing the words in Act 2, scene 3, just before the finale; this melodic phrase is also quoted in the overture to the opera. Da Ponte used the line "Così fan tutte le belle" earlier in Le Nozze di Figaro (Act 1, scene 7).