The Marriage of Figaro

The Marriage of Figaro, comic opera in four acts by Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte), which premiered in Vienna at the Burgtheater on May 1, 1786. Based on Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais’s 1784 play Le Mariage de Figaro, Mozart’s work remains a favourite in the operatic repertoire.

Background and context

In 1782, as Mozart was making his way as a composer in Vienna, Count Orsini-Rosenberg, director of the Burgtheater (the imperial theatre), invited him to write an opera buffa. The young composer was in favour at the court of Emperor Joseph II, but he had stiff competition in established local composers, including Antonio Salieri, Vicente Martín y Soler, and Giovanni Paisiello. Mozart was hoping for greater fame and financial security, and in his choice of material he was influenced by the unprecedented success in Vienna of Paisiello’s Il barbiere di Siviglia (1783), which was based on Beaumarchais’s earlier play Le Barbier de Séville (1775; The Barber of Seville). That work would later also become the basis of Italian composer Gioachino Rossini’s The Barber of Seville (1816). Beaumarchais’s sequel had been translated into German. Performances of the play were planned in Vienna, but the emperor refused permission to stage the work, allowing only its publication. (Joseph had heard from his sister Marie Antoinette about the troubles the play had caused in Paris.) Da Ponte, one of the poets of the imperial court, removed political content and faithfully translated the rest into Italian—the appropriate language for the opera buffa that Mozart intended to compose. The emperor allowed the project to go forward without objection. With Mozart’s masterpiece of a score, the result was a witty yet profound tale of love, betrayal, and forgiveness.

The Marriage of Figaro was in some ways an instant success. Its bubbling overture, its brilliantly crafted arias—which give insights into the personalities of the characters who sing them—and its lively and intricate ensemble scenes won the hearts of nearly all who witnessed it. Encores became so numerous that after the work’s third performance the emperor declared that, to keep the evening to a reasonable length, only numbers written for a single voice could be repeated in any opera. (As it turned out, this edict may not have been enforced.)

Partisans of Mozart’s rivals did their best to spoil the early performances. Orsini-Rosenberg had favoured another librettist over Da Ponte, and he was not inclined to make the production go smoothly. Late in the summer, one local reviewer remarked upon “the unruly mob in the gallery” that was still determined to disrupt the performances with noise. Yet, the journalist added, the opera “contains so many beauties, and such a richness of thought as can proceed only from the born genius.”

The opera was performed only nine times during 1786 in Vienna, perhaps because Martín y Soler’s Una cosa rara (also set to a libretto by Da Ponte) came on the scene and essentially pushed the Mozart work aside. The Marriage of Figaro made a more durable impression in its next performances, in Prague later in 1786. In January 1787 Mozart and an entourage including his family traveled to Prague by invitation to attend the opera and spend time with local music lovers and patrons; he conducted at least one performance himself. Encouraged by the opera’s favourable reception, the theatre’s director asked Mozart to write something new specifically for Prague. That work would be the opera Don Giovanni.

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Cast and vocal parts

• Count Almaviva, a nobleman (baritone)
• Countess Rosina, the count’s wife (soprano)
• Figaro, the count’s valet (baritone)
• Susanna, the countess’s maid and Figaro’s betrothed (soprano)
• Cherubino, a page (mezzo-soprano)
• Doctor Bartolo, a physician (bass)
• Marcellina, Bartolo’s housekeeper (mezzo-soprano)
• Don Basilio, a music master (tenor)
• Antonio, a gardener (bass)
• Barbarina, Antonio’s daughter (soprano)
• Don Curzio, a lawyer (tenor)
• Villagers, peasants, servants, wedding guests

Setting and story summary

The Marriage of Figaro is set in Count Almaviva’s castle near Seville (now Sevilla), Spain, in the late 18th century.

Act I

Count Almaviva’s castle, in an empty room where Figaro and Susanna will live after their marriage.

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Figaro is measuring a space for his nuptial bed while his fiancée, Susanna, tries on her bridal hat. She does not like their new bedroom. Her objection confounds Figaro, for the room is conveniently close to the bedrooms of the Count and Countess whom they serve. But Susanna warns Figaro that it is all too convenient and close for the Count, who is plotting with her music master, Don Basilio, to seduce her. The Countess rings for her, and Susanna leaves. Alone, Figaro vows revenge (“Se vuol ballare, signor Contino”) and storms off in a rage.

Dr. Bartolo enters with his housekeeper, Marcellina. Figaro had once promised to marry her, and Bartolo promises her that he will find a way to hold Figaro to his promise. Bartolo would love to take revenge on Figaro for having earlier foiled his plan to marry Rosina (now the Countess). Bartolo leaves to put his scheme into effect. Susanna returns, and Marcellina jealously spars with her, then leaves in a huff. The teenaged page Cherubino comes in. He tells Susanna that he is in love with the Countess, but the Count has caught him with young Barbarina (Susanna’s cousin and daughter of the gardener Antonio). Cherubino cannot contain his romantic desires (“Non so più cosa son, cosa faccio”).

Cherubino hides behind a chair when the Count arrives to beg Susanna for a tryst before he goes to London with Figaro on diplomatic business. But his wooing is interrupted by the arrival of Don Basilio, and the Count seeks a hiding place. He heads for the chair that conceals Cherubino, forcing the boy to jump into the seat. Susanna hastily covers him with a cloth. When the jealous Count hears Basilio gossip about Cherubino and the Countess, he reveals himself. Basilio naturally concludes that the Count and Susanna are in a relationship. This is all too much for Susanna, who begins to faint. The Count and Basilio rush to her aid and try to get her into the chair where Cherubino is concealed, but she revives and orders them away. The Count vows to make Cherubino leave the castle. When Susanna expresses sympathy for the boy, the Count tells her that Cherubino has been caught with a woman before. Recalling how he found the page hiding under a tablecloth in Barbarina’s room, he lifts the cloth that conceals Cherubino. The Count accuses Susanna of dallying with the boy.

Their argument is interrupted by the arrival of Figaro and a group of peasants. Figaro leads them in singing the Count’s praises for having abolished the feudal droit du seigneur, the right of the lord of the manor to sleep with his servant’s bride on her wedding night. Figaro invites the Count to place the bridal veil on Susanna as a symbol of his blessing on their marriage, which is to take place later that day. The Count is forced to agree, but he privately vows to help Marcellina marry Figaro instead. He also gets Cherubino out of the way by drafting him into his regiment. Figaro teases the boy, who now must trade his pursuit of women for the “glories” of war (“Non più andrai, farfallone amoroso”).