Audio By Carbonatix
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Departing from canon’s a time-honored practice. Pierre Beaumarchais’ 1778 non-musical The Marriage of Figaro was banned in Vienna for licentiousness, so Lorenzo Da Ponte’s libretto for Mozart’s opera version amped up the emotional content of the sexytimes and also threw in a diatribe against cheating wives. (Oh, patriarchy! How can we stay mad at you?)
Figaro’s the sequel to The Barber of Seville, first operatized by some dude — giving us the equivalent of Ang Lee’s Hulk. Some decades after Mozart, Gioachino Rossini composed the Seville that’s endured. Either you can’t wait for Figaro III: The Guilty Mother, or you’re like us and only recognize any of these titles because of Bugs Bunny.
The thing is, Arizona Opera brings Mozart’s TMOF to Symphony Hall, 75 North Second Street, through Sunday, April 7.
April 5-6, 7:30 p.m.; Sun., April 7, 2 p.m., 2013
