"Follie" and "Sempre libera" from La Traviata

Listening Guide

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Featuring Edita Bruberova as Violetta, Neil Shicoff as Alfredo, and the Orchestra and Chorus of the Teatro La Fenice in Venice, Italy, conducted by Carlo Rizzi

Composer: Giuseppe Verdi

Composition: "Follie" and "Sempre libera" from La Traviata

Date: 1853

Genre: recitatives and aria from an opera

Form: alternates between singing styles of accompanied recitative, with some repetition of sections

Nature of Text: libretto by Francesco Maria Piave; View Complete Libretto and Translation.

Performing Forces: soprano (Violetta), tenor (Alfredo), and orchestra

What we want you to remember about this composition:

  • The virtuoso nature of Violetta's singing
  • The subtle shifts between recitative and aria, now less pronounced than in earlier opera
  • A large orchestra that stays in the background

Other things to listen for:

  • Alfredo's more lyrical melody in distinction to Violetta's virtuosity

Timing

Performing Forces, Melody, and Texture

Text and Form:

Violetta sings a very melismatic and wide-ranged melody with flexible rhythm; the orchestra provides sparse accompaniment.

Accompanied recitative: Follie! follie! Delirio vano è questo!

[Folly! All is folly! This is mad delirium!]

Povera donna, sola, abbandonata in questo popoloso deserto che appellano Parigi. Che spero or più? Che far degg'io? Gioire, di voluttà ne' vortici perir.

[A poor woman, alone, lost in this crowded desert which is known to men as Paris. What can I hope for? What should I do? Revel in the whirlpool of earthly pleasures.]

Violetta sings wide leaps, long melismas, and high pitches to emphasize these words

Accompanied recitative: Gioir!

(Pleasure!)

Stronger orchestral accompaniment Aria:as Violetta sings a more tuneful melody in a lilting meter with a triple feel

Sempre libera degg'io folleggiare di gioia in gioia, vo' che scorra il viver mio pei sentieri del piacer. Nasca il giorno, o il giorno muoia, sempre lieta ne' ritrovi, a diletti sempre nuovi dee volare il mio pensier.

[Forever free, I must pass madly from joy to joy. My life's course shall be forever in the paths of pleasure. Whether it be dawn or dusk, I must always live. Ah! Gaily in the world's gay places, ever seeking newer joys.]

Alfredo sings a more legato and lyrical melody in a high tenor range (this melody comes from earlier in the opera)

Alfredo's melody: Amore, amor è palpito…dell'universo intero – Misterioso, misterioso, altero, croce, croce e delizia, croce e delizia, delizia al cor.

[Love is the very breath......of the universe itself -Mysterious and noble, both cross and ecstasy, cross and ecstasy of the heart.]

Violetta sings her virtuoso recitative and then transitions into her aria style

Accompanied recitative and then aria: Follie…Sempre libera

[Folly! Folly! Ah yes! From joy to joy, forever free, I must pass madly from joy to joy. My life's course shall be forever in the paths of pleasure. Whether it be dawn or dusk, I must always live. Ah! Gaily in the world's gay places, ever seeking newer joys, etc.]

Alfredo sings his lyrical melody and Violetta responds after each phrase with a fast and virtuosic melisma

Alfredo and Violetta sing: Repetition of text above

[ALFREDO: Love is the very breath of the universe itself.

VIOLETTA: Oh! My thoughts have to seek new joys. Oh! My thoughts. My thoughts.]