The Storming of the Bastille took place three years after Mozart's Marriage of Figaro (1786) and eleven years after the Beaumarchais play on which it was based. Yet the sun was already setting on the ancien régime. Beaumarchais' Figaro, which features the comeuppance of a lascivious aristocrat, is inevitably a political play; yet Mozart's genius makes it a personal drama played out in terms of universal human emotions. We shall also look at how Mozart addressed both the personal and political themes in Don Giovanni (1787) and The Magic Flute (1791).

In pursuing these ideas, I shall play scenes from Figaro and the other two operas. I shall have to jump around rather than summarizing their often complicated stories in linear fashion. If you are not sure of what happens in each, therefore, it might be helpful to read the brief synopses I have provided above.
 

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, 1756–91. Austrian composer.   A child prodigy as both performer and composer, Mozart produced an extraordinary body of work in all genres over a relatively short life. The greatest of his many operas are those he wrote after moving to Vienna: his three collaborations with librettist Lorenza da Ponte—The Marriage of Figaro (1786), Don Giovanni (1787), and Così fan tutte (1790)—framed by two German Singspiels: The Abduction from the Seraglio (1782) and The Magic Flute (1791).