1 Carolyn Abbate and Roger Parker, ‘Introduction On Analyzing Opera’, Analyzing Opera Verdi and Wagner, ed. Abbate and Parker (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1989), 1–24 (p 19)Google Scholar

2 Ibid., 23–4Google Scholar

3 Abbate and Parker, ‘Dismembering Mozart’, Cambridge Opera Journal, 2 (1990), 187–95 (p 188), the ridicule, of course, is aimed at critics of Mozart's operas, not at the operas themselvesGoogle Scholar

4 Ibid., 195, again, the barb is aimed at those who fail to heed the callGoogle Scholar

5 Webster, James, ‘Mozart's Operas and the Myth of Musical Unity’, Cambridge Opera Journal, 2 (1990), 197–218 (p 198)Google Scholar

6 Ibid., 211 A fourth item, not drawn upon here, is Roger Parker's share of an exchange with me, which appeared under the collective title ‘A Key for Chi? Tonal Areas in Puccini’ in 19th Century Music, 15 (1992), 229–34Google Scholar

7 Of the first type there are too many examples to cite here, especially of the sort that discuss long-range tonal relationships with little or no reference to the drama; for citations, see Abbate and Parker, ‘Introduction’, and Webster, ‘Mozart's Operas’ As for the second type, two notable examples are Catharine Clement, Opera, or the Undoing of Women, trans Betsy Wing (Minneapolis, 1988), and Peter Conrad, A Song of Love and Death The Meaning of Opera (New York, 1987)Google Scholar

8 The link between multivalency and ambiguity and the privileging of the latter over unity and coherence are somewhat surprising given that all three essays show the influence (whether acknowledged or not) of the paradigmatic study by Pierluigi Petrobelli, ‘Music in the Theatre (à propos of Aida, Act III)’, Themes in Drama, 5 Drama, Dance and Music, ed James Redmond (Cambridge, 1981), 129–42 Yet as I read Petrobelli's analysis of the Amonasro-Aida duet, the point seems to be that all the elements of the opera – drama (plot), verbal organization (versification) and music – work together in a coherent, unambiguous way. I read the same intent into the analyses of another article with a multivalent approach, Harold S Powers, ’ “La solita forma” and “The Uses of Convention”’, Acta musicologica, 59 (1987), 65–90 Powers writes (p 90) ‘Verdi saw to it that action, words and musical elements were coordinated until they were inextricably fused ’ Nor does the essays’ idea of multivalency seem to be derived from the way in which that term was used at the Cambridge University Music Analysis Conference held in September 1986. Malcolm Miller defines its use there as ‘the capacity for a single phenomenon to project different interpretations’ This use of the term multivalency would seem to stand apart both from the ideas of Petrobelh and Powers, who see multiple phenomena working together, and from those in our essays, which claim that multiple phenomena work independently of one another On the idea of multivalency at the Cambridge conference, see Malcolm Miller's review of the conference in ‘Multivalency and Comparative Analysis Aspects of Musical Postmodernism’, Studies in Music [The University of Western Australia], 21 (1987), 98–101 Just as certainly, the essays do not use the term multivalence in the sense in which it is used in chemistry, where it signifies an atom that can display more than one valence, that is, it can gain or lose a variable number of electrons upon interacting with other atoms In all, our essays' linking of multivalency with the idea of ambiguity/disjunction and their privileging of the latter seem to strike out independently of previous ideas about multivalency and multivalent analytical approaches and probably owe a debt to a somewhat vague strain of deconstructionism Finally, though the stridency of the essays is not at issue here, it does call for comment simply put, they sometimes go (with glee and with a sense, at least some of the time, of ‘putting us on?) beyond even everyday rudeness As for the title ‘Dismembering Mozart’, rest assured though he – Mozart – is stripped of unity and coherence, he comes through with arms and legs intactGoogle Scholar

9 This has already been noted by William Kinderman in connection with the Abbate and Parker Mozart essay, see his ‘Subjectivity and Objectivity in Mozart Performance’, Early Music, 19 (1992), 593–600 (p 593)Google Scholar

10 Nicolaisen, Italian Opera in Transition 1871–1893 (Ann Arbor, 1980), 228–37 We should take immediate note of Nicolaisen's own analytical bias (no pejorative intended). ‘Readily perceived, such broad tonal gestures second and are seconded by the drama They betray a greater concern with tonal planning and a recognition that tonal organization functioning over the span of an entire act is a tool as valuable for the Italian as for the German music-dramatist’ (p 232)Google Scholar

11 References are to the current Ricordi vocal score, plate no. 95567, ed Mario Parenti (Milan, 1960, repr 1978), and refer to rehearsal number (in bold) and bars before or after (with minus or plus signs) On the complicated publication history of the opera, see Scherr, Suzanne, ‘Editing Puccini's Operas The Case of “Manon Lescaut”’, Acta musicologica, 62 (1990), 62–81Google Scholar

12 A piano-vocal score of the Mass – with the mauthentic title Messa di Gloria and no indication of the editor – was published by G Ricordi and Mills Music in 1952Google Scholar

13 Apart from the transposition and the rescoring of the vocal forces, the most substantial revision consists of Puccini's having cut out bars 21–32 of the Mass movement with an elision that connects bars 20 and 33 At present, the best discussion of the self-quotation is in Michele Girardi, ‘La rappresentazione musicale dell'atmosfera settecentesca nel second'atto di “Manon Lescaut” ’, Esotismo e colore locale nell'opera di Puccini Atti del I Congresso internazionale sull'opera di Giacomo Puccini 1983, ed Jürgen Maehder (Pisa, 1985), 65–82 (p 72)Google Scholar

14 The minuets are based on various sections of the Tre minuetti per quartetto ad archi of c 1889–90 The three minuets were originally published at Milan by Pigna in 1890 or 1892 (no date indicated) In subsequent publications by Heugel (1898) and Ricordi (1902), no 2 was omitted, and no 3 was renumbered as no 2, which is how they still appear in the Kalmus edition of 1991 On both Puccini's use of the minuets in Acts 1 and 2 of Manon Lescaut and the bibliographical errors and confusion caused by the renumbering in the Heugel and Ricordi editions, see Girardi, ‘La rappresentazione musicale’, 74–80Google Scholar

15 See ibtd., 80–1.Google Scholar

16 The timing is based on the compact disc with Maria Callas and Giuseppe Di Stefano, conducted by Tullio Serafin, EMI CDS 7473938Google Scholar

17 Puccini even helps the historically and stylistically unaware by clearly identifying the genres in the dialogue. (1) just before the Madrigale, Manon says to Lescaut ‘Son musici! È Geronte che fa dei Madrigali!’ (11/–2), (2) shortly after the Madrigale, she says ‘I Madrigali! Il ballo! E poi la musica! ’ (12/ + 12), (3) during the A minor section of the minuet sequence, Geronte comments ‘Minuetto perfetto’ (16/ + 9), and (4) the third line of Manon's song is ‘la fida pastorella’ (22/ + 8), with the word ‘pastorella’ being particularly easy to pick up owing to its rhyme with ‘bella’ at the end of line 1Google Scholar

18 Nicolaisen's Parts 2–5 appear in the autograph score at ff. 167^v–68, 188, 212 and 225 respectively I am grateful to the Archivio Storico of Casa Ricordi for providing me with a microfilm We should note, though, that the current Ricordi vocal score has a double bar at 13, as do all earlier published scores. What is not clear, however, is whether or not the double bar originated with Puccini's authority (though its continued presence in one published version of the opera after the other at least speaks for his having approved of it) Indeed, the relationship between the autograph and the published scores is particularly complicated with respect to Manon Lescaut, whether in terms of the opera as a whole, Act 2 in particular, or, even more specifically, the very articulation at 13; see Scherr, ‘Editing Puccini's Operas’, 62–81, and her in-progress dissertation at the University of Chicago Finally, on the question of whether or not such palaeographical evidence should even be admitted, see note 28 belowGoogle Scholar

19 On the pre-existent model from which Puccini derived Jake's melody, see my article, ‘Belasco and Puccini “Old Dog Tray” and the Zuni Indians’, The Musical Quarterly, 75 (1991), 362–98Google Scholar

20 References are to the current Ricordi vocal score, plate no 113300, ed Mario Parenti (Milan, 1963, repr 1988) For an orchestral score, see the easily available reprint in the Kalmus Orchestral Library, A 6449 (Boca Raton, Florida, n d)Google Scholar

21 Although the IV⁺⁶ chord now has a suspended a sounding through it, its sense of identity with the chord at the beginning of the scene is not shaken.Google Scholar

22 On the designation of Jake's melody as the opera's ‘theme song’, see Carner, Mosco, Puccini A Critical Biography (2nd edn, New York, 1974), 405–6, and, with far greater detail, my articleGoogle Scholar

‘“Lontano-Tornare-Redenzione”- Verbal Leitmotives and their Musical Resonance in Puccini's La fanciulla del West‘, forthcoming in Studi musicali.Google Scholar

23 The cadence appears at a number of important articulations 21/–2, 22/–3, 23/+ 3, 24/–2 (particularly important) and 26/ + 8Google Scholar

24 On this aspect of Puccini's style, see Nicolaisen, Italian Opera in Transition, 195, Parker, ‘Analysis Act I in Perspective’, Giacomo Puccini Tosca, ed Mosco Carner, Cambridge Opera Handbooks (Cambridge, 1985), 117–42 (pp 130–1), William Drabkin, ‘The Musical Language of La boheme’, Giacomo Puccini La boheme, ed Arthur Groos and Roger Parker, Cambridge Opera Handbooks (Cambridge, 1986), 80–101 (p 90)Google Scholar

25 Berg, Karl Georg, Giacomo Puccinis Opern Musik und Dramaturgie, Marburger Beiträge zur Musikwissenschaft, 7 (Kassel, 1991), 39 I call the melody the ‘waltz-love’ theme on the grounds that this theme, which plays an important role in both love duets, served earlier as the melody to which Minnie, Johnson and the miners waltzed – to the refrain of ‘La, la, la ’ – in Act 1 (86).Google Scholar

26 The continuity draft for Acts 1 and 2 – which I assume to represent the last stage of sketching and drafting before the orchestral score – is preserved at New York, The Pierpont Morgan Library, Robert Owen Lehman Deposit, MS without signature My references to the draft are to Act 2, pp 27–8 and 40 For a discussion and reproduction of one page from the draft – Act 1, p 72 (= 98/–4 to 98/ + 1) – see J Rigbie Turner, Four Centuries of Opera Manuscripts and Printed Editions in The Pierpont Morgan Library (New York, 1983), 98–9Google Scholar

27 I am currently working on a study of Puccini's sketching process as exemplified mainly by La fanciulla del WestGoogle Scholar

28 I am well aware of the disagreements concerning the use of sketches and drafts to settle questions of analysis and interpretation; see Johnson, Douglas, ‘Beethoven Scholars and Beethoven Sketches’, 19th Century Music, 2 (1978–9), 3–17, and the responses to Johnsen by Sieghard Brandenburg, William Drabkin and Joseph Kerman in 19th Century Music, 2, 270–9, 3 (1979), 187–8; 6(1982), 177–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar

29 Abbate and Parker. ‘Dismembering Mozart’, 194–5.Google Scholar

30 See Carteggi pucciniani, ed Eugenio Gara (Milan, 1958), 417, no 638, see also Carner, Puccini, 202Google Scholar

31 Puccini's attitude toward the metre of his texts seems ambiguous On the one hand, he often browbeat his librettists into providing verses on predetermined metrical models, on the other, Des Grieux sings ‘Donna non vidi mai’ in Act 1 of Manon Lescaut to versi imparisillabi (a mixture of eleven-, seven- and five-syllable lines), though that same melody had already set a quatrain of versi ottonari as part of the dramatic scene and aria entitled Mentia l'avviso, where it set the words ‘È la notte che mi reca / Le sue larve, i suoi timori’ Moreover, the versification of ‘Donna non vidi mai’ is not even consistent from libretto to score, as Puccini expanded lines 3 and 5 from versi settenari (sdrucciolo and piano respectively) to versi endecasillabi. On Puccini's attitude toward poetic metre, see Jürgen Maehder, ‘The Origins of Literaturoper Guglielmo Ratcliff, La figlia di Iorio, Parisina, and Francesca da Rimini, Reading Opera, ed Arthur Groos and Roger Parker (Princeton, 1988), 92–128 (p. 94–5), for a discussion and edition of Mentia l'avviso, see the wonderful study by Michael Kaye, The Unknown Puccini (Oxford and New York, 1987), 33–14 On the question of the audibility of the ‘text’ in general, see the comments of Paul Robinson, ‘A Deconstructive Postscript’ Reading Libretti and Misreading Opera', Reading Opera, 328–46, who, of course, is reluctant to grant the status of audibility to most aspects of the verbal textGoogle Scholar

32 A review of the Puccini literature since about 1958, though with emphasis on the last decade or so, is being prepared by Helen Greenwald for a forthcoming volume of Acta musicologicaGoogle Scholar