As they all emerged from the background towards the foreground of the stage (Adina's family farm), they found their fixed positions. During this moment the orchestra builds an image of what is to come or to be expected. It initially starts with what I believe to be cellos making, not slow but not rapid sounds repeatedly for a moment. However, I am unsure if there is a modulation occurring in the music due to my opinion that the music is switching from minor the major. What indicted a sudden shift in mode, from minor to major, was the inclusion of the woodwinds and the brass instruments. The most accented instruments that I heard are the flutes, clarinets, trumpets, horns, and trombones. For the most part, the flutes played their typical fluttering tune. The music was mostly very upbeat, and to my surprise it lacked dissonance even though there were a lot of instruments playing at once. Like I had mentioned before, I expected the music to demonstrate a lot of consonance, which it does.
During the music before Nemorino (played by Vittorio Grigolo) sings his aria, is where I believe Bartlett Sher responds to the Risorgimento. The music's tempo retards, and then the tempo demonstrates presto as it quickens once again right before the similar repetition of the cello playing when the villagers initially made their appearance on the stage. In this production, nationalism appears in the first scene: the villagers sing in union, "It's a great solace to the harvester when the sun is at its hottest, to rest and draw breath under a bench tree, at the foot of a hill. The fierce noonday heat is tempered by the shade and running stream. But loves scorching flame cannot be soothed by shade or stream. Happy the harvester who can protect himself from it " (Act 1, Scene 1). The librettist, Felice Romani, played an important part in shaping the possible underlying meaning and messages behind his lyrics and how the lyrics were sung.