Summarizes and criticizes Powers’s article (#1852). How did the audience
develop the expectations that Powers says Verdi manipulated? Basevi is not a
reliable guide to this area, and Powers is wrong to accept his views. Parker
doubts that audiences were aware of the standard forms or the departures
from them.- Jablonsky, Stephen. “The Development of Tonal Coherence as Evidenced in
the Revised Operas of Giuseppe Verdi.” Ph.D. diss., New York U., 1973.
465p.
The author’s imaginative approach was to compare original and revised ver-
sions of 12 pairs of musical numbers taken from six pairs of operas. He found
that there was increased tonal coherence and more logical connection among
key centers in the revisions. - Lawton, David. “Tonality and Drama in Verdi’s Early Operas.” Ph.D. diss., U.
of California, Berkeley, 1973. 2v.
The operas up to and including Rigolettoare examined from the viewpoint of
tonal structure, both micro- and macrolevels. Up to Macbeth,Verdi may have
changed keys to satisfy singers; thus, tonal design was obscured. But he did not
make such alterations thereafter, so his intentions are clear. Various devices are
identified: referential use of keys, repeated series of keys in cadential patterns,
and the shaping of large forms through key relations. Although convincing
answers are not found here—for example, Lawton is unable to determine a
key center for Rigoletto;he seems to find it in a mystic point between D major
and D-flat major—the questions raised are stimulating and the analyses are
exacting. See also the author’s #1867 and #1911. - Moreen, Robert Anthony. “Integration of Text Forms and Musical Forms in
Verdi’s Early Operas.” Ph.D. diss., Princeton U., 1975. 338p.
A unique approach, examining the “relationship of the prosodic form of the
libretti of Verdi’s operas to the musical and dramatic shape of the operas.”
Finds that the division of the numbers of the early operas, and other patterns
in them, grow out of poetic-structural demands. Both micro- and macrolevel
consequences are discussed in the works through La traviata. - Pagannone, Giorgio. “Aspetti della melodia verdiana: Periodi e barform a con-
fronto.” Studi verdiani12 (1997): 48–66.
Discusses the function in Verdi of ternary (ABA, AABA, or periodo) and
binary (AAB, or barform) structures in arias. Barform was used to heighten
dramatic movement, often with a change of key. With 35 extensive footnotes
to the related literature and musical examples from many operas. - Webster, James. “To Understand Verdi and Wagner We Must Understand
Mozart.” 19thCM11 (1978): 175–193.
A view developed later in #1288, that the search for unity in operas is not
working and that other approaches are needed. Summarizes recent efforts at
macroanalysis of Verdi’s works.
Giuseppe Verdi 347