A Toccata of Galuppi's

[6] The poem is written in the first person, but the voice is not that of Browning himself: the speaker, unlike the poet, has never been out of England, and is picturing life in 18th-century Venice through his response to Galuppi's music.

"[6] The speaker, more interested in science than the arts,[7] even gives Galuppi the wrong first name ("Baldassaro" for the correct "Baldassare", an error perpetuated by some literary critics).

[7][8] After the speaker's fanciful and superficial evocation of old Venice, in stanzas I to IX, the voice goes on to muse on the nature of immortality, first of art and then of life itself.

[6] The poem inspired a 1989 setting, in modern idiom but with musical quotations from Galuppi's works, by the composer Dominick Argento.

[9] The singer-songwriter Kris Delmhorst based her song "Galuppi Baldassare", the first track of her 2006 album Strange Conversation on the poem, using many of the words and theme as a basis for her own lyrics.