Songs, Song-Texts, and Lovesickness in Agustín Moreto's Yo por vos y vos por otro

In recent years, a considerable amount of scholarship has been produced on the function of music in the drama of Lope de Vega and Calderón de la Barca. But songs, dances, instruments, and other music references abound in the works of other important Spanish Golden Age dramatists. Because of the significant role music plays in many of his plays, special attention should be devoted to the repertoire of the preeminent dramatists Agustín Moreto. This essay focuses on the relationship between music and text in Yo por vos y vos por otro (1676), and particularly on how music is utilized during critical junctures as a way to underscore, on the one hand, the work's references to period notions of lovesickness, and on the other, to support the work's dramatic structure and technique. The function of music in this play is an example of the need for further study and reevaluation of a significant portion of Moreto's repertoire.