The Barber of Seville buffe". After two hundred years, it remains a popular work. Rossini's opera recounts the events of the first of the three plays by French playwright Pierre de Beaumarchais that revolve around the clever and enterprising character named Figaro, the barber of the title. Mozart's opera "The Marriage of Figaro," composed 30 years earlier in 1786, is based on the second part of the Beaumarchais trilogy. The first Beaumarchais play was originally conceived as an opéra comique, but was rejected as such by the Comédie-Italienne. The play as it is now known was premiered in 1775 by the Comédie-Française at the
The Marriage of Figaro fly] To the desire of [the one] who adores you" (K. 577) in July 1789, and to replace "" he wrote "" – "A joyous emotion", (K. 579), probably in mid-1790. The voice types which appear in this table are those listed in the critical edition published in the "Neue Mozart-Ausgabe". In modern performance practice, Cherubino and Marcellina are usually assigned to mezzo-sopranos, and Figaro to a bass-baritone. "The Marriage of Figaro" continues the plot of "The Barber of Seville" several years later, and recounts a single "day of madness" () in the palace of Count Almaviva near Seville, Spain.