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Which musical features does Mozart use to make the Commandant’s statue seem supernatural?
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Don Giovanni
Illustration (c. 1914) of a scene from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's opera Don Giovanni (1787), in which Don Giovanni attempts to seduce Zerlina.
To convey the supernatural nature of the Commandant’s statue in Don Giovanni, Mozart employs several distinct musical techniques during the opera's climactic supper scene:
- Instrumentation: Mozart utilizes trombones to provide a unique, otherworldly sonority that distinguishes the statue from the other characters.1
- Harmonic and Rhythmic Devices: The music features extreme chromaticism and "wildly lurching" harmonies that create a sense of instability and dread as the statue confronts the libertine. Additionally, Mozart employs hieratic, or solemn, dotted rhythms to underscore the statue's imposing and rigid presence.1
- Foreshadowing: The supernatural threat is established early in the opera through foreboding chords in the overture, which symbolize Don Giovanni’s ultimate fate and foreshadow the statue's eventual movement.2
These elements combine to create one of the most formidable and dramatic scenes in Mozart's repertoire, effectively signaling the transition from the opera's comic elements to the protagonist's final descent into hell.21