Research About Dramatic-Musical Structure Of Operatic Acts And Scenes-Taking

This dissertation will focus on the dramatic-musical structure of operatic acts and scenes. Boris Godunov, Othello and Madama Butterfly will be examples for discussion. Through analyzing the dramatic and musical structure of these three operas, the relationship between the structural layout of acts and scenes and the dramatic, musical development will be explored.This dissertation will be divided into five chapters. The first chapter is about the structural elements of the drama and opera. It will lay a foundation for later discussion about the musical structure of operatic acts and scenes by using dramatic structural theories. In the first part, I will define the conception of drama, dramatic structure. The developmental process of dramatic theories will be presented as well. Then I will overview the contents of dramatic theories and give a brief introduction of the other three relevant theoretic elements. In the second part, I will define and represent operatic elements. Then I will overview the form and evolutionary process of main operatic structural form and discuss the dramatic structural pattern——libretto of the opera.The following chapters will consecutively analyze three operas.Every opera will be discussed mainly from three aspects——overview of operas, analysis of dramatic structure and musical structure. Overview of operas will relate to the composing process, performance and review of every opera and its literary resource and version issues. The horizontal, vertical structural analysis and the main structural power of the dramatic structural will be under discussion in the analysis of dramatic structure part. It is about musical analysis in the third part. I will focus on the basic elements of operatic scenario construction, the structural analysis of acts, scenes and scenario, the analysis of the tonal structural layout. The structural analysis of operatic acts and scenes in the second part is the key point of this dissertation, besides the analysis of the overall musical structure of the opera, every act and some scene will be analyzed in Boris Godunov and Othello. Scenes, the basic musical structural unit in Madama Butterfly will be under discussion. In the third part, I will analyze the overall tonal arrangement and the tonal layout of every act and every scene.The last chapter is a conclusion. It is a summary and induction about the dramatic and musical structure of acts and scenes in operas by taking three operas as examples.