With the sound of merry-making retreating to the background (violin parts, bars 97-105), the wretched man’s stupor finally induces sleep. From there, the penultimate ritornello restores F major in a welter of new syncopation as the dance dissolves into an unreal, spinning world. Already dangerously wayward, the music’s behavior now takes on a drunk’s capacity for self-delusion: an assured (but premature) return to the tonic key in bars 72-4, followed by a convincing lunge (in the wrong place) to the dominant. The movement’s second phase thus arrives early as if the sudden onset of drunkenness comes as a shock to both inebriate and bystander. Timed with the drunkard’s first serious totter (bar 41), the first change of key is not the normal step to the dominant but the beginning of a radical modulation – to G minor, with its overtones of impending disaster. Thereafter, Vivaldi’s structural game-plan – increasing musical volatility to reflect increasing inebriation – is more subtle than it might at first sight appear. The first movement manages to convey crudeness with artful grace, initially in a repetitive ritornello of primitive’ harmony and a similar first solo rooted to the steps of the peasants’ dance.

Autumn vivaldi violin