The arias in a Verona opera concert

La donna è mobile

This is the Duke of Mantua's song at the start of act 3 of Verdi's Rigoletto, and it is written to show off a tenor. The opera had its triumphant first performance at La Fenice in Venice on 11 March 1851. The aria was rehearsed under tight secrecy before the premiere, because it was so catchy, and it soon became popular among Venetian gondoliers. The title means woman is fickle. The tune returns offstage later in the act, and that reprise drives the plot, so it is a character piece as much as a showpiece. Rigoletto was Verdi's sixteenth opera and is widely seen as the first of his great middle-to-late works.

Una furtiva lagrima

A furtive tear is the romanza that Nemorino sings in act 2 of Donizetti's comedy L'elisir d'amore. He has bought a love potion with all his money, and it is only cheap red wine. When he sees Adina weeping, he decides it is working. Donizetti gave the aria real tenderness inside a comic plot, and it closes on a long coloratura run over the word chiedo. The comedy was first staged at Milan's Teatro della Canobbiana on 12 May 1832, and it has stayed in the repertory since. The comedy's central theme is the triumph of sincerity over trickery.

The Habanera

The Habanera is the entrance aria of the title role in Bizet's Carmen, sung by a mezzo-soprano in scene 5 of act 1. Its proper name is L'amour est un oiseau rebelle, love is a rebellious bird. Bizet built it on a habanera by the Spanish composer Sebastián Iradier, which he believed was a folk song, and he added a note about its source to the score. Célestine Galli-Marié sang it at the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875. It is sung in French, unlike the three Italian pieces. Nietzsche, a great admirer of Carmen, called the aria ironically provocative.

The Intermezzo

The Intermezzo comes from Pietro Mascagni's one-act opera Cavalleria rusticana, a classic of the verismo school first heard at Rome's Teatro Costanzi on 17 May 1890. In the opera it is an orchestral interlude that plays while the village square is empty. No singer is needed, so at a concert with piano it gives the voices a rest and lets the pianist carry the line. Its melody has been used in films and was adapted into an Ave Maria soon after the opera appeared. The opera is often paired with Leoncavallo's Pagliacci in a double bill.

Why the line-up changes

These four pieces are named for the programme, but guests mention others, including piano pieces, so the programme moves between dates. The performers are a tenor, a mezzo-soprano and a pianist, and their selection suits that trio: tenor arias, a mezzo-soprano aria and duets. A tenor is the highest standard adult male voice, and a mezzo-soprano sits between soprano and contralto. If you want to know what will be sung on your date, the organiser decides, so the best plan is to enjoy whatever comes.

Read next: Your first opera concert in Verona

Who this isn't for

Nothing in this guide promises repertoire, and the concert is not a place to hear a whole opera. Each piece here is one number from a work that lasts two or three hours. If you want the whole of Rigoletto or Carmen, you need a staged production, and Verona's theatres and Arena offer those in their seasons. If you simply like to know what a piece is about before you hear it, these paragraphs give you the story in a few lines.