"Il mio tesoro" (or "") is an

aria In music, an aria (, ; : , ; ''arias'' in common usage; diminutive form: arietta, ; : ariette; in English simply air (music), air) is a self-contained piece for one voice, with or without instrument (music), instrumental or orchestral accompan ...

for

lyric tenor A tenor is a type of male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. Composers typically write music for this voice in the range from the second B below mi ...

voice from scene 2 in act 2 of

Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756 – 5 December 1791) was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition and proficiency from an early age ...

's opera ''

Don Giovanni ''Don Giovanni'' (; K. 527; full title: , literally ''The Rake Punished, or Don Giovanni'') is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. Its subject is a centuries-old Spanish legen ...

''. It is often performed in recitals and featured in anthologies of music for tenor."Il mio tesoro"
, Aria Database In the aria, Don Ottavio, a young nobleman, urges the listener to assure his (the nobleman's) beloved fiancée, Donna Anna, that he intends to secure vengeance for her against the man who murdered her father.

Libretto

Il mio tesoro intanto andate a consolar, E del bel ciglio il pianto cercate di asciugar. Ditele che i suoi torti a vendicar io vado; Che sol di stragi e morti nunzio vogl'io tornar. My treasure, meanwhile, Go and console. And from her beautiful eyes, the tears, Try to wipe away. Tell her that the wrongs against her, I'm going to avenge, That only of killing and death As announcer will I return.

Music

The aria is set in

B-flat major B-flat major is a major scale based on B, with pitches B, C, D, E, F, G, and A. Its key signature has two flats. Its relative minor is G minor and its parallel minor is B-flat minor. The B-flat major scale is: Changes needed for ...

and in cut common time (), with tempo indication of '' Andante grazioso''. It is 101 bars long and takes about four minutes to perform. Its

vocal range Vocal range is the range of pitches that a human voice can phonate. A common application is within the context of singing, where it is used as a defining characteristic for classifying singing voices into voice types. It is also a topic of stud ...

covers D3 to A4, while its tessitura is roughly F3 to G4. For most of the piece, the violins and violas play ''con sordino'' (with mutes) for a mellow effect. In addition to the strings, the aria uses

clarinet The clarinet is a Single-reed instrument, single-reed musical instrument in the woodwind family, with a nearly cylindrical bore (wind instruments), bore and a flared bell. Clarinets comprise a Family (musical instruments), family of instrume ...

s in B-flat, bassoons and B♭ alto horns.

In other media

A concert performance of "Il mio tesoro" is mentioned in the opening paragraphs of

Tolstoy Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy Tolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; ,Throughout Tolstoy's whole life, his name was written as using pre-reform Russian orthography. ; ), usually referr ...

's novel ''

Anna Karenina ''Anna Karenina'' ( rus, Анна Каренина, p=ˈanːə kɐˈrʲenʲɪnə) is a novel by the Russian author Leo Tolstoy, first published in book form in 1878. Tolstoy called it his first true novel. It was initially released in serial in ...

'' Excerpts from it are sung by the protagonist's father in the 1949 black comedy film ''

Kind Hearts and Coronets ''Kind Hearts and Coronets'' is a 1949 British crime film, crime black comedy film directed by Robert Hamer. It features Dennis Price, Joan Greenwood, Valerie Hobson and Alec Guinness; Guinness plays eight characters. The plot is loosely based ...

''.

References

External links

Mozart's autograph manuscript

Bibliothèque nationale de France The (; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites, ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository of all that is published in France. Some of its extensive collections, including bo ...

*, sung by

Luigi Alva Luis Ernesto Alva y Talledo (10 April 1927 – 15 May 2025), known professionally as Luigi Alva, was a Peruvian operatic tenor who worked internationally at the major opera houses and festivals. A Mozart and Rossini specialist, Alva achieved f ...

, Aix-en-Provence Festival 1960 {{DEFAULTSORT:Mio Tesoro, Il Arias from Don Giovanni Tenor arias Opera excerpts 1787 compositions Compositions in B-flat major Songs about revenge