Venite, inginocchiatevi (Le nozze di Figaro, K. 492)

Beaumarchais's La folle journée, ou le Mariage de Figaro was banned from the Viennese stage when Lorenzo Da Ponte persuaded Joseph II to allow an operatic version, stripped of its political speeches. Mozart composed the score in 1786 and conducted the premiere at the Burgtheater on 1 May. Vienna received it with reserve; Prague, later that year, made it a sensation, and the commission for Don Giovanni followed. The comedy survives its own intrigue because Mozart gives every character — servant, countess, adolescent — music of equal seriousness, and lets a day of deception end in something close to forgiveness.