The Ensemble Scene – a Vector of Musical Dramaturgy in Verdi’s Conception: “Don Carlo”
The Ensemble Scene – a Vector of Musical Dramaturgy in Verdi’s Conception: “Don Carlo”

Summary/Abstract: Starting from the idea of the evolution and function of the great ensemble scenes in opera performance, this research aims to illustrate the indelible link between scenic and musical dramaturgy, by concentrating the entire expressive force of an opera into a single point of maximum tension, with scenic and musical ramifications in subsequent key moments of the opera. We will highlight this aspect, typical of the Romantic musical and dramaturgical conception introduced by Giuseppe Verdi's mature operas, by analysing the ensemble scene at the end of the second act (the auto-da-fé scene) of Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Don Carlo (the four-act Italian version), in which the musical dramaturgy of the entire opera is based on three prominent and recurrent musical “gestures”: the interval of a fourth as a melodic element, chord repetition as a harmonic projection and the isorhythmic triplet formula as a rhythmic figure.

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