CHIEF among Italian opera composers of the present day are Puccini, Mascagni, and Leoncavallo. Others are Giordano, Wolf-Ferrari, Zandonai, Montemezzi, and Leoni.

Modern Italian opera differs from Italian opera, old style, largely through the devotion of the moderns to effects of realism—the Italian verismo, of which we hear so much. These effects of realism are produced largely by an orchestral accompaniment that constantly adapts itself descriptively to what is said and done on the stage. At not infrequent intervals, however, when a strongly emotional situation demands sustained expression, the restless play of orchestral depiction and the brief exchange of vocal phrases merge into eloquent melody for voice with significant instrumental accompaniment. Thus beautiful vocal melody, fluently sung, remains, in spite of all tendency toward the much vaunted effect of verismo, the heart and soul, as ever, of Italian opera.

Much difference, however, exists between the character of the melody in the modern and the old Italian opera. Speaking, of course, in general terms, the old style Italian operatic melody is sharply defined in outline and rhythm, whereas the melody of modern Italian opera, resting upon a more complicated accompaniment, is subject in a much greater degree to rhythmic and harmonic changes. Since, however, that is little more than saying that the later style of Italian opera is more modern than the older, I will add, what seems to me the most characteristic difference in their idioms. Italian melody, old style, derives much of its character from the dotted note, with the necessarily marked acceleration of the next note, as, for example, in "Ah! non giunge" ("La Sonnambula"), an air which is typical of the melodious measures of Italian opera of the first sixty or seventy years of the last century; and that, too, whether the emotion to be expressed is ecstasy, as in "Ah! non giunge," above; grief, as in Edgardo's last aria in "Lucia di Lammermoor,"—"Tu che a Dio spiegasti l'ali" (Thou has spread thy wings to Heaven), the spirit of festive greeting as in the chorus from the previous act of the same opera, or passionate love as in Elvira's and Ernani's duet; "Ah morir potessi adesso."

It does not occur as frequently in Rossini as in Bellini and Donizetti, while Verdi, as he approaches his ripest period, discards it with growing frequency. I am also aware that the dotted note is found in abundance in the music of all civilized countries. Nevertheless it is from its prominence in the melodic phrase, the impetus imparted by it, and the sharp reiterated rhythmic beat which it usually calls for, that Italian melody of the last century, up to about 1870, derives much of its energy, swing, and passion. It is, in fact, idiomatic.

Wholly different is the idiom of modern Italian music. It consists of the sudden stressing of the melody at a vital point by means of the triolet—the triplet, as we call it. An excellent example is the love motif for Nedda in "I Pagliacci," by Leoncavallo.

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If the dotted note is peculiarly adapted to the careless rapture with which the earlier Italian composers lavished melody after melody upon their scores, the triolet suits the more laboured efforts of the modern Italian muse.

Another effect typical of modern Italian opera is the use of the foreign note—that is, the sudden employment of a note strange to the key of the composition. This probably is done for the sake of giving piquancy to a melody that otherwise might be considered commonplace. Turiddu's drinking song in "Cavalleria Rusticana" is a good example.

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In orderly harmonic progression the first tone in the bass of the second bar would be F-sharp, instead of F-natural, which is a note foreign to the key. This example is quoted in Ferdinand Pfohl's Modern Opera, in which he says of the triolet and its use in the opera of modern Italy, that its peculiarly energetic sweep, powerful suspense, and quickening, fiery heart-beat lend themselves amazingly to the art of verismo.