Files
Abstract
The term "dramma giocoso" has long been connected with Goldoni. His first use was in the printed libretto for L'Arcadia in Brenta (1749, set by Baldassare Galuppi). Over the course of the following decade Goldoni refined his approach to creating comic librettos, culminating in the production of his La buona figliuola (1760, set by Niccolò Piccinni). The fantastic success of this opera and its wide dissemination established Goldoni as a leading figure in the realm of comic opera. His method of writing comic librettos was inspired by a small group of singers, most notably Francesco Baglioni, Serafina Penna, and Giovanni Lovattini, whose unique talents and frequent collaboration with Goldoni drove the developments that set the dramma giocoso apart from the opera buffa that came before. In particular, these three singers where the most important early interpreters of the role di mezzo carattere. This new role category, which is mixed of equal parts serious and comic, allowed Goldoni to "intertwine" the serious and the comic portions of the cast and, as a result, to produce remarkably unified and efficient plots. The success of these operas inspired a good deal of imitation and eventually became the dominant fashion in comic opera at least until the generation of Wolfgang Mozart.