3. L'elisir d'amore. Building a Climax. The featured sequence this week is what we might call the Extended Act I Finale of Donizetti's Elixir of Love. Starting with a solo, the texture builds to a duet, then a trio, and finally to an ensemble involving the entire chorus.

But we might equally well have chosen the beginning of the opera, which is another continuous sequence introducing the major characters of the rural village where the opera is set: Adina, the magnetic young landowner, and Nemorino, the simple farmer who yearns for her in vain. It also introduces the first of the two characters who arrive from the outside world, serve as catalysts, then leave a day later. This is the womanizing Sergeant Belcore, who looks like succeeding where Nemorino had failed.

The second arrival is Dr. Dulcamara, a traveling quack. Adina had been reading the story of the love-potion that united Tristan and Isolde. Nemorino asks Dulcamara if he can supply such an elixir, and gladly accepts the wine he bottles under a new label. It appears to work, though rather too well, thus precipitating the chaos of the first-act finale—which will take a full act more to clear up. rb.

There is a very good six-minute introduction to the opera from the Royal Opera House in London; you can watch it here. It shows rehearsals for the production by Laurent Pelly that I mention in class, but ultimately decided not to show, because the principals on the DVD are nowhere near as good as those here, or in the Vienna production which I shall show. rb.

 
Other resources will be posted immediately after class.