La Clemenza di Tito
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La clemenza di Tito (The Clemency of Titus), K. 621, is an opera seria written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. It was in fact his very last opera, being started after the bulk of Die Zauberflöte was already written (though Mozart did not complete Die Zauberflöte until his return to Vienna after the Prague premiere of Tito) . Alleged by Mozart's earliest biographer Niemetschek to have been completed in just 18 days — in such haste that the simple recitatives were supplied by another, probably Mozart's pupil Süssmayr — Tito was commissioned for the coronation of Emperor Leopold II as King of Bohemia.
The opera was first performed on September 6, 1791 at the Estates Theatre in Prague.
It remained popular for many years after Mozart's death (Stivender, p. 502). But for a long time Mozart scholars regarded Tito as an inferior effort of the composer. Alfred Einstein in 1945 wrote that it was "customary to speak disparagingly of La clemenza di Tito and to dismiss it as the product of haste and fatigue," and he continues the disparagement to some extent by condemning the characters as puppets — e.g., "Tito is nothing but a mere puppet representing magnanimity" — and claiming that the opera seria was already a moribund form (Einstein, Mozart, pp. 408-11). However, in recent years the opera has undergone something of a reappraisal. Stanley Sadie considers it to show Mozart "responding with music of restraint, nobility and warmth to a new kind of stimulus" (New Grove Mozart, p. 164).
The opera is based on a libretto by Metastasio, edited into a more useful state by court poet Caterino Mazzolà, whom, unusually, Mozart credited for his revision in Mozart's own catalog of his compositions. The story is based on the life of Roman Emperor Titus Flavius Vespasianus, and was elaborated by Metastasio from some brief hints in the Lives of the Caesars by the Roman writer Suetonius.
Given the similarity of Mozart's score and plot with some aspects of La clemenza di Scipione by Johann Christian Bach, it is likely that Mozart knew and was influenced by the older composer's work to a certain extent.
Synopsis
In Act I, Vitellia, daughter of deposed emperor Vitellius, wants revenge against Titus and stirs up Titus' vacillating friend Sextus, who is in love with her, to act against him. But when she hears word that Titus has sent Berenice, of whom she was jealous, back to Jerusalem, Vitellia tells Sextus to delay carrying out her wishes, hoping Titus will choose her (Vitellia) as his empress.
Titus, however, decides to choose Sextus' sister Servilia to be his empress, and orders Annius (Sextus' friend) to bear the message to Servilia. Since Annius and Servilia, unbeknownst to Titus, are in love, this news is very unwelcome to both. Servilia decides to tell Titus the truth but also says that if Titus still insists on marrying her, she will obey. Titus thanks the gods for Servilia's truthfulness and immediately forswears the idea of coming between her and Annius.
In the meantime, however, Vitellia has heard the news about Titus' interest in Servilia and is again boiling with jealousy. She urges Sextus to go assassinate Titus. He agrees, singing one of the opera's most famous arias, "Parto, parto." Almost as soon as he leaves, Annius and the guard Publius arrive to escort Vitellia to Titus, who has now chosen her as his empress. She is torn with feelings of guilt and worry over what she has sent Sextus to do.
Sextus, meanwhile, is at the Capitol wrestling with his conscience as he and his accomplices go about to burn it down. The other characters (except Titus) enter severally and react with horror to the burning Capitol. Sextus reenters and announces that he saw Titus slain, but Vitellia stops him from incriminating himself as the assassin. The others lament Titus in a slow, mournful conclusion to Act I.
Act II begins with Annius telling Sextus that Emperor Titus is in fact alive and has just been seen; in the smoke and chaos, Sextus mistook another for Titus. Soon Publius arrives to arrest Sextus, bearing the news that it was one of Sextus' co-conspirators who dressed himself in Titus' robes and was stabbed, though not mortally, by Sextus. The Senate tries Sextus as Titus waits impatiently, sure that his friend will be exonerated; but the Senate finds him guilty, and an anguished Titus must sign Sextus' death sentence.
He decides to send for Sextus first, attempting to obtain further details about the plot. Sextus takes all the guilt on himself and says he deserves death, so Titus tells him he shall have it and sends him away. But after an extended internal struggle, Titus tears up the execution warrant for Sextus and determines that, if the world wishes to accuse him (Titus) of anything, it can charge him with showing too much mercy rather than with having a revengeful heart.
Vitellia at this time is torn by guilt and decides to confess all to Titus, giving up her hopes of empire in the well-known rondo "Non più di fiori." In the amphitheater, the condemned (including Sextus) are waiting to be thrown to the wild beasts. Titus is about to show mercy when Vitellia offers her confession as the instigator of Sextus' plot. Though shocked, the emperor includes her in the general clemency he offers. The opera concludes with all the subjects praising the extreme generosity of Titus, while he himself asks that the gods cut short his days when he ceases to care for the good of Rome.
References
- David Stivender, ed. and trans., "La Clemenza di Tito" (libretto), in The Metropolitan Opera Book of Mozart Operas, NY: HarperCollins, 1991.
- Alfred Einstein, Mozart: His Character, His Work, NY: Oxford University Press, 1945.
- Stanley Sadie, The New Grove Mozart, NY: Norton, 1983.
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