The original libretto is arranged for a genuine vaudeville. All the dramatic interest lies in the spoken dialogue; the songs are, with a few exceptions, superfluous additions, and imply a very moderate amount of execution. Mozart undertook to indicate to Stephanie where and how, in the interests of the composer, alterations should be made, and only left to him the framing of the text, with which it was not necessary to be so particular, if only the situations were well arranged in their main features. The principal point, next to giving to the musical element of the piece its due prominence as the most fitting expression of lyric sentiment, was the proper consideration of the individualities of the performers themselves. Fortunately this task was not complicated in the way which had so often been the case. Madame Cavalieri was certainly more of a bravura singer than anything else, and neither her appearance nor her acting was effective; but Adamberger and Fischer were just as Mozart would have had them, both as singers and actors, and Fischer especially was an extraordinarily gifted artist. The part of Osmin, which was created for him, shows the influence of a congenial spirit on the conceptions of the creating artist. When Mozart was fairly embarked in the work, he wrote to his father about the libretto and the alterations already made in it (September 26, 1781):-- The opera began with a soliloquy which I have begged Herr Stephanie to turn into a little ariette, and also, instead of the two chattering together after Osmin's song, to make a duet out of the dialogue. As we have given the part to Fischer, who has an excellent bass voice (although the Archbishop once told me he sang too low for a bass, and I assured his grace that he would sing higher next time), we must give him something to do, especially as he is such a favourite with the public. In the original book Osmin has only one little song, and nothing else but the terzet and finale. I have given him an aria in the first act, and he is to have another in the second. I have trusted the aria altogether to Stephanie, the music was ready before he knew a word about it. {DIE ENTFÜHRUNG AUS DEM SERAIL.} (224) These alterations were of specially good dramatic effect in the first scene, and Osmin's song called to life the first German comic aria which deserves to be called great. In the second act the dialogue between Blondchen and Osmin becomes a duet; on the other hand, a superfluous duet between Constanze and Blondchen is very rightly omitted. Instead of it Constanze has the great bravura song "Mar-tem aller Arten," chiefly as a concession to the singer; for the repetition of the scene in which she scornfully rejects the Sultan's proposals is in every way superfluous. Blondchen's second song--newly inserted--is, however, quite appropriate; in it she expresses her joy at her approaching deliverance; so that the original duet is really embodied to a certain extent in these two songs.