I've talked many times here about performance practice in the past -- how musicians used to change the music they played, and how they often improvised their changes.

We know that, of course, and the standard word for what they used to do is "ornamentation." What we don't often hear, though, is how extensive those changes used to be. So here's a striking example. It's a passage from the Almamiva-Figaro duet in the first act of The Barber of Seville, as sung by Manuel Garcia, the tenor who created the role of Count Almaviva. It was published years later in a book, The Art of Singing, by his son, Manuel Garcia, Jr., one of the most famous voice teachers in the 19th century.