Luigi Bassi as Don Giovanni

One way of arriving at a historically informed interpretation of Don Giovanni is to study the portrayal of the title role by the singer for whom Mozart wrote it: Luigi Bassi (1766–1825). Chapter 1, ‘Luigi Bassi as Don Giovanni’, provides the general outlines of Bassi’s portrayal as conveyed by nineteenth-century reviews and memoirs, by anecdotes told by his friends and fans, and by the performance tradition he founded as stage director in Dresden. Remarkable for his handsome, elegant appearance and charming stage presence, Bassi was close to the ideal comic actor of the late eighteenth century. Specialising in nuanced, idealising portrayals that struck a balance between sympathy and laughter, he was admired more for his integration of vocal, facial and bodily expression than for his singing in purely musical terms. Contemporaries put emphasis on the nobility, stateliness, dignity, bearing, decorum, subtlety, humour, lightness, grace, elegance, chivalrousness, charm, gallantry, ardour and vitality of his Don Giovanni, while there was no trace of arrogance and violence. The chapter especially explores Friedrich Schiller’s definition of the term ‘grace’ as a key to understanding how Bassi’s contemporaries experienced his Don Giovanni.