aria (music)

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Melodic solo song of reflective character, often with a contrasting middle section. It is used to express a moment of importance in the action of an opera or oratorio. Already to be found in Jacopo Peri's Euridice (1600) and Claudio Monteverdi's Orfeo (1607), it reached its more elaborate form in the work of Alessandro Scarlatti and George Frideric Handel, becoming a set piece for virtuoso opera singers. An example is Handel's ‘Where'er you walk’ from the secular oratorio Semele (1744) to words by William Congreve. In instrumental music, an aria may be the title of a songlike piece, or a theme suitable for variations.

By the early 18th century an aria was a song in three sections, of which the third repeated the first, while the second introduced variety of subject matter, key, and mood. This is known more exactly as the ‘da capo aria’.

After Handel's death (1759) and Mozart's youth (1760s) less rigid forms developed, sometimes based on sonata form (Mozart), and later shaped by the dramatic action of an opera (Beethoven,Weber) or oratorio (Mendelssohn).

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