Comparison And Analysis On Mozart And Verdi’s Baritone

The famous Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is honored as a music prodigy and genius. And the great revolutionary composer Italian Giuseppe Verdi is reputed as the King of Opera. Both of them are composition masters with tremendous popularity and have made great contributions to the development of opera.Mozart and Verdi’s arias are listed as the main parts in university vocal art education and perform. Though Mozart and Verdi lived in different ages,(Mozart was the representative of classical music in18th century while Verdi was the representative of romantic music in19th century.) in music itself, there are no limitations in time and space. Therefore, we can see similarities in baritones of two artists’ opera works. Let’s take Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro and Verdi’s Macbeth for instance. Both of them are operas with baritone as protagonists. And the scripts originate in dramas.(The Marriage of Figaro is based on the comedy with the same name, which is created by French dramatist Beaumarchais. Macbeth stems from one of the four great tragedies which is created by Shakespeare in1606.The four tragedies are Hamlet, Othello, Ling Lear and Macbeth.)However, because of the different historical periods,, family conditions and social backgrounds, the two composers show obvious distinctions in shaping baritone characters. For example, the hero Figaro in The Marriage of Figaro is a comic character while Macbeth is played as a tragic character. Besides, there are many other differences and similarities.The Chinese famous composer, pianist, music theorist and educator, professor in Shanghai Conservatory of Music, doctoral supervisor Professor Zhao Xiaosheng once said:" The history of music is the history if literature." There is no exception in the world opera. Mozart and Verdi’s works represent their ages.They are regarded as great works of history and also reflect different aspects of social life.For these reasons, through Mozart and Verdi’s works, on the basis of the research findings before and my vocal experience, this article aims to have a profound analysis and exploration in voice department system, character designing, the recreation in aria, the historical background in opera and composers’sociality.As I was to work, I hope to take this opportunity to have a careful analysis and exploration on the opera baritone to find the differences and similarities between Mozart and Verdi. And this will help me apply the research achievement to stage performing and teaching. I hope my research can help singers have a more accurate and deep understanding for the composers’ creation essence and purpose, and then perform more authentic, more objective and more vivid. I also hope my research can help vocal professors in teaching these two artists’works. All in all, I hope my study can have a good influence on performing and teaching.