ABSTRACT
Tonal relations by thirds lie beyond the logic of the diatonic tonal system, and the fourths and fifths of real-time enlightened music. At the level of real-time music, many of the most important dramatic moments in the opera reference these tonal relations. Elvira's ten variants of a descending triad and two further notes sound her obsessive attachment to Giovanni. A terrifying fortissimo tutti chord of G# announces the stone man, who, in naming Giovanni, at last finds the third term of the seminal tonal triangle of D minor. The overall structure of the first half of the second finale, the supper scene, is similar to that of the first finale of this opera and Così fan tutte, insofar as there is very rarely any dominant modulation, or indeed modulation of any kind, within sections. As Da Ponte remarked at the time, Mozart treated the idea of the stone guest with the utmost seriousness.
