The Barber of Seville Study Guide - Manitoba Opera

INTRODUCING The Barber of Seville!
The Barber of Seville has been around for almost 200 years and continues to
delight audiences worldwide. Its infectious humour and memorable melodies
turn up today everywhere from Bugs Bunny cartoons to cell phone ring tones.
The story of The Barber of Seville is the first of a trilogy of plays by the
French playwright Beaumarchais (1792-1868). In the years before the French
Revolution, Beaumarchais’ plays challenged the class system and raised the
ire of the monarchy. Something about his questioning of the status quo
obviously resonated with the public because six operatic versions of the play had already
emerged prior to Rossini’s. The most popular of these was by Italian composer Giovanni
Paisiello. Paisiello had a reputation for being difficult so the young Rossini tried to avoid
conflict by calling his version Almaviva, ossia l’inutile precauzione (The Useless Precaution).
The Rossini version gained in popularity and eventually donned the name by which it is
known today.
For all its success, the opera didn’t have an easy birth. It was written in an unbelievably
short time. From the start of the libretto arriving to the time of the finished score was three
weeks. Rossini wrote non-stop, taking pages out of the hands of the librettist Cesare Sterbini
while the ink was still wet and transforming them into the arias we know today. He managed
his impossibly tight deadline by borrowing some of the music from his
other operas. In fact, one of the most famous pieces from the opera, the overture, had
actually been used as the overture for two of his other operas!
Opening night was a disaster. Everything that could go wrong did go wrong. Guitars broke,
cues were missed, and arias were booed. By the time the weary singers got to the finale
a cat wandered on to the stage and began meowing at the singers. The audience laughed
hysterically and meowed back at the cat. Rossini was so upset that he took to his bed the
next day claiming illness. Fortunately though, the tide of public opinion changed quickly, the
opera was selling out within a few days… and the rest is musical history!
SYNOPSIS OF The Barber of Seville
Place: Seville
Time: Seventeenth Century
ACT I.
Count Almaviva comes in disguise to the house of Dr. Bartolo to
serenade Rosina (“Ecco ridente”). Dr. Bartolo keeps Rosina confined
to the house. Almaviva pays the musicians and decides to wait until
daylight in the hope of seeing her. Figaro the barber, who has access
to the houses in Seville and knows the town’s secrets and scandals,
arrives and describes his busy life (“Largo al factotum”). The Count
sings another serenade to Rosina, calling himself Lindoro, a poor
student. Figaro devises a plan: the Count will disguise himself as a
drunken soldier quartered at Dr. Bartolo’s house to gain access to
Rosina, whom Dr. Bartolo intends to marry. The Count is excited
about this plan while Figaro looks forward to a nice cash pay-off from
the grateful Count (“All’idea di quel
metallo”).
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