This early and rather old-fashioned song with its plaintive charm displays much of the typical delicacy, directness, and simplicity that Bellini was later to bring to the operatic stage, as a response to what he perceived as over-elaborate fussiness where emotion was sacrificed to virtuosity. The short piano introduction, with its quiet minor intervals, sets the melancholy mood, and the vocal line immediately begins the first melodic theme. The middle section briefly utilizes a slightly more declamatory vocal line, and then the song returns to the first theme, and ends on a brief piano postlude drawn from the introduction. Throughout, Bellini uses a two-note motif that expresses the idea of tears.

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