Service communications

"Where did you put the keys? / Look in the third drawer in the kitchen.
How long until you arrive? / We'll be there in five minutes, you can throw away the pasta...»
Some of you have perhaps emotional when reading this pro­saic and daily exchange of words? I guess not, but let's try another example:
«Eh, write I say and I'll take everything on myself. Song on the air / on the air
What a sweet zeffiretto / zeffiretto
This evening he will expire / this evening he will expire…
Under the pine grove / sot­to…. under the pine trees of the grove".

This back and forth, where one says and the other repeats in writing, has it moved you by any chance? Probably not, and yet this exchange is became immortal. This is the Canzonetta sull'aria from the third act of the Marriage of Figaro.
The countess is dictating to Su­sanna a simple note to deliver to the count, a service communication we could say. But try listening to it dressed in the notes of Mozart, who enjoys imitating the action carried out by the characters: the melody of each phrase dictated by the countess is repeated by the solo oboe and the bassoon while Susanna puts it on paper, repeating only the last syllables. I challenge you not to be moved. Are you tough?

Know that in the scene perhaps more beautiful of the film The Shawshank Redemption, starring Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman, the protagonist, a prisoner, decides to broadcast this duet on the prison's internal radio, to make everyone feel free, even if just for a moment. The pro­tagonist is deeply moved by this wonderful music, even if he admits that he doesn't know what the singers are saying, imagining however that the topic is "such a thing" beautiful that it cannot be expressed with simple words." And instead, as we have seen, these are two women who plot to deceive the husband of one of them.

But the power of Mozart's music rises above the topics discussed, high above the prison walls, making the inmates feel free for a moment. The words of the protagonist are significant in this regard: «This is the beauty of music: no one can take it away from you… is It's here that music makes sense. It is used so as not to forget that there are places in this world that are not made of stone, and that there is something inside you that no one else can tell you touch or remove it if you don't want it.


Mauro Tabasso and Valentina Giaresti
NP April 2024