In January and February 1787, W.A. Mozart was in Prague conducting several performances of his most recent and successful opera The Marriage of Figaro when he received a commission for a new opera, which was to be based on the literary theme of Don Juan, to be premiered in Prague in October. He rushed back to Vienna to meet with Lorenzo Da Ponte, the author of the Figaro libretto. They agreed on the terms and each went about his task. While waiting for the first pages of the libretto, Mozart could well have worked on the overture but left it to the last minute.
Don Giovanni, the overture and the legend
Numerous and varied are the legends about the opportunity in which Mozart wrote the overture of Don Giovanni ossia Il disoluto punito (...the punished libertine). Some say that he wrote it the day before the premiere, others that he finished it a few hours before. A very sympathetic one refers that, after attending a merry evening on the eve of the premiere, Wolfgang and Konstance left after midnight because Wolfgang had to compose an overture. The conditions were not the best, but Konstance managed to keep Mozart awake with a pitcher of punch and tasty stories that she told him all night long. By seven in the morning, the overture was finished. Be that as it may, it was not the first time – nor would it be the last – that Mozart had composed a work in a jiffy.
In Prague, the premiere of the two-act dramma giocoso was a resounding success. The indefatigable optimist Wolfgang Amadeus, who made a sense of humor almost a reason for living (of which he had little left, let us say in passing), wrote in this mood to a friend shortly after the premiere:
"On October 29 my opera Don Giovanni had its first performance, and was received with great applause. Yesterday it was given for the fourth time (and this time to my full benefit)... I intend to leave here on the 12th or 13th.... but everyone wants me to stay here a few more months, and compose a couple of operas. As flattering as the offer is, I can't accept it... My great grandfather used to say to his wife, my great-grandmother, who in turn told her daughter, my grandmother, who repeated it to her daughter, my mother, who used to remind her daughter, my own sister, that to talk well and eloquently was a very great art, but that an equally great one was to know the right moment to stop. So I intend to follow my sister's advice as it was handed down to her by our mother, our grandmother, and our great-grandmother, and I take this opportunity to put an end not only to this moralizing digression, but also to the whole letter."
The overture to Don Giovanni lasts just over five minutes. The Westminster Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by British conductor Daniel Harding, performs this version.
