Cosi Fan Tutte

The old cynic Don Alfonso, tired of hearing his two young friends rhapsodize about the perfection of their fiancées, is determined to crush their naiveté. He proposes a wager to test the fidelity of their young sweethearts: he bets the young ladies will be unfaithful to their beloveds – under the right circumstances – within 24 hours. The young men readily agree to the wager, confident that the idea is preposterous.

The young women are attended by the willing and vivacious servant, Despina, who is much more a woman of the world than they are. Don Alfonso enlists her help to make the plan work, and she readily agrees. The farce begins.

This was Mozart’s third and last collaboration with the librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte, after Le nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni. This trio of near perfect marriages of music and words are all concerned with the battle of the sexes. In the first two the women come out in a better light, but in Così fan tutte, it is the reverse. Or possibly, Don Alfonso hoped to teach the men that they should be more realistic about human nature: that women are fallible – and so are we all!