Tear Jerker / L'Orfeo

• The news of Eurydice's death is devastating to every party involved, especially Orpheus, who had just finished singing about how happy he was and can't believe he's still alive while Eurydice is dead. Sylvia is so distressed at both failing to revive her and having to deliver the bad news that she exiles herself.
  • Garsington Opera's version made it worse by having Sylvia also be Eurydice's mother, making the moment where she had to break the news of her death even more tragic.
• In Act III, despite being moved by Orpheus's singing, Charon refuses to let him cross to meet Hades. Orpheus grows despondent and laments being stuck between heaven and hell like a wandering shade, and softly pleads for his love to return to him.
• Orpheus's despair when he turns and loses Eurydice again is heartwrenching, as are the spirits showing him no mercy while Eurydice sadly wonders if he lost her from loving too much. Orpheus begs to be allowed to stay with her in death, but even that is denied, and he finds himself in the fields of Thrace, alone and despondent.
• In Act V, Orpheus's grief turns into a darker version of his earlier happiness; where before he compared his joy to the eyes of Argus, now he compares his grief to them and says if they were all overflowing it still wouldn't compare to his own sorrow.

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