Antonio Vivaldi's setting of Pietro Metastasio's dramatic masterpiece L'Olimpiade premiered in Venice in 1734. L'Olimpiade was one of Metastasio's finest texts, and was set innumerable times in the eighteenth century. The plot comes from the story of The Trial of the Suitors, found in the sixth book of the Historiae of Herodotus. The love entanglements in the tale were aptly suited to the tastes of eighteenth-century audiences, who nightly went to the theater to see lovers misunderstand one another and become reconciled. In this story, the nobility of two women triumphs over tensions caused when two men fall in love with the same leading lady. The plot is both heroic and pastoral, and Metastasio plans for a good deal of entertaining spectacle distributed throughout the opera. To set the text, Vivaldi borrowed a good deal of music from an earlier score of his, one that probably set the opera Lucio Vero. His opera contains two very powerful instances of dramatic accompanied recitative for Megacle, and one of the most stirring vocal numbers in all of his operas for the two lovers. Megacle is a very strong character of heroic stature, and in both scenes of accompanied recitative, his strength breaks down due to the intense internal conflict he is feeling over his love for Aristea and his friendship for Licida. In Act I, scene 9, rapid modulations through a series of sharp keys illustrate his turbulent emotional state as he becomes agitated. This is quickly followed by rapid modulations through a series of flat keys as he becomes filled with despair. He begins to panic toward the close of his soliloquy and the texture of the accompaniment changes. Nervous, agitated figures appear in the upper strings, while the vocal line becomes extremely disjunct and broken. When Aristea berates him in the second act, he is again torn. Short phrases, agitated bursts of notes, modulations, and texture changes all mirror his confusion. Finally he settles into a gloomy F minor, and melismas, grace notes, and affective intervals express his sadness. When Megacle and Aristea are reunited in Act I, they have a beautifully wrought lovers' duet in which Megacle's torment and Aristea's joy combine together in rich harmonies and expressive dissonance. For brief passages they sing of the power of their love for one another, and come together in consonant homophony.

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