As with all good things, the age of the
castrati came to an end. As classical virtues lost their foothold with the coming of the French Revolution, so the
opera seria began to fail to hold the interest of European audiences. As the
opere serie were virtually the castrato's
raison d'être, the need for them became virtually non-existent, and they were discarded as quickly as a paddleball after the County Fair. The last major opera that featured a
role written expressly for a castrato was Meyerbeer's
Il Crociato in Egitto. It had been well nigh twenty years since the public had heard the voice of a castrato, and it is said that when
Giovanni Battista Velutti (1781-1861), the last great castrato, sang his first notes, some of the theatre-goers burst into laughter. The castrato was a novelty—an antique of a now passé musical style. The result was that Velutti's role was taken over by Giuditta Pasta. Velutti [pictured left, click to enlarge] made his final appearance on the London stage in 1829, and with his retirement, so ended the age of the castrato.
Well, in opera, at least. Meanwhile, in the Sistine Chapel the castrati continued to be members of the choir. There was a temporary halt when the Papal States came under the rule of Napoleon in 1808, but after his removal in 1815, the castrati were reinstated. In 1870, the church officially banned castration but continued to employ whatever castrati that remained in the Sistine Chapel choir.
As chance would have it, a pair of field recorders for Gramophone & Typewriter Company who had come to cut a gramophone cylinder of the Pope's voice in the spring of 1902 happened upon the Sistine Chapel choir and in 1902 managed to make several recordings of it, along with the last known surgical castrato, the only castrato to have been recorded in solo —
Alessandro Moreschi (1858-1922). Moreschi was probably castrated around 1865, just five years shy of the ban. While studying music at the Scuola di San Salvatore in Lauro, he was discovered by Gaetano Capocci, who became his teacher. In 1883 he was admitted to the Capella Sistina, after being heard performing the role of Seraph in the oratorio
Christus am Ölberge by Beethoven. At that time Moreschi's voice was a high soprano of extraordinary purity and agility, to such an extent that he was nicknamed "Angelo di Roma" and made soloist of the Capella Sistina by the pope. After being made a secretary of the Chapel, Moreschi was promoted to the director of the choir, and two years later appeared singing in the funeral of Italian king Umberto I at the Pantheon.
The seventeen recordings were
released on CD in the 1990's. Of them, eight are solo Moreschi. The quality of the recordings is exceptionally low, as the quality of all recordings was at the time. The singing is… interesting. The sound of a castrato is itself so distinct and indescribable that the first word that comes to mind is "freak." It is important to note, however, that Moreschi was, by this point in his life, not a great singer, by any means. He was well past his prime, if he ever had one. His style is not that of the castrati of the Baroque era, but one of the over-emotive early 19th century religious music. Listeners today are often disconcerted with the scoops and excessive portamenti and seemingly intentional register breaks. It's easy to be judgemental, but one must remember that having been castrated never assured a boy of a great voice, and there were always as many bad voices as good, if not more. Moreschi may have simply been a bad singer, but whatever the case, we have been blessed with these indispensable documents—the only recordings ever made of a solo castrato voice. Here is Alessandro Moreschi performing the Bach-Gounod "Ave Maria" and Paolo Tosti's "Preghiera":
But perhaps more interesting is not the solo Moreschi recordings, but those with the chorus. The members of the Cappella Sistina were not credited by name, and little was written about the group as a whole, but the evidence in surviving photos seems to support the idea that there were other older castrati in the choir
[click on the photos to view larger versions]. In the chorus photo in the third paragraph, there is a man standing at the left of Moreschi who appears to be the same fellow at the back-right of the group photo in this paragraph. In the signatures photograph, at least one and possibly two of the men besides Moreschi is a castrato; one
Giovanni Cesari is labelled "
soprano (acuto)." Likewise in the upper chorus photo, at the bottom left, is a man who looks remarkably similar to
Domenico Mustafà, another of
the last castrati in the Sistine Chapel choir. Furthermore, when listening to the ensemble works on the disc, one can discern the other soprani or contralti that do not sound like falsettists (though there were a few in the choir). This is especially prominent in the Palestrina madrigal for four voices,
"La cruda mia nemica."
By March 1913 Moreschi had retired from the Cappella Sistina to his home in Rome, where he spent the rest of his life. He performed on occasion, such as under a mass celebration at the Capella Giulia in 1914. He was also a friend of a German writer Franz Habock, author of the extremely important
Die Kastraten und ihre Gesangskunst, who planned to revive the Farinelli repertoire with Moreschi in 1914. However, the grand plan failed to became a reality due to several obstacles on the way—probably the war and the decay of Moreschi's voice, yet Habock himself point out the main reason for the failure: Moreschi, as all the other Capella singers, was simply unqualified of singing the Baroque repertoire in a proper way, as it had become almost impossible to find teachers even remotely connected with the grand tradition of Tosi and Mancini, the teachers of the great castrati of the 18th century.
Regarding Moreschi's appearance Habock had this to say, after seeing him in 1914:
"Moreschi was of average height and rather short in stature; he had no facial hairs and his chest was broad and overdeveloped. In his youth, when he sang the Seraph`s oratorio at the age of 25, his vocal range was from C' to E''. Now however, at the end of his career, his range is only from A to G''. Moreschi's speaking voice have a certain silverine quality to it, and reminds much of a high tenor. However, both his appearance and voice gives an impression of him still being a young person."[Moreschi was 56 years old at this time.]
In the spring of 1922, Moreschi caught pneumonia and died shortly afterwards at his home in Rome.
Related links:
As with all good things, the age of the castrati came to an end. As classical virtues lost their foothold with the coming of the French Revolution, so the opera seria began to fail to hold the interest of European audiences. As the opere serie were virtually the castrato's raison d'être, the need for them became virtually non-existent, and they were discarded as quickly as a paddleball after the County Fair. The last major opera that featured a role written expressly for a castrato was Meyerbeer's Il Crociato in Egitto. It had been well nigh twenty years since the public had heard the voice of a castrato, and it is said that when Giovanni Battista Velutti (1781-1861), the last great castrato, sang his first notes, some of the theatre-goers burst into laughter. The castrato was a novelty—an antique of a now passé musical style. The result was that Velutti's role was taken over by Giuditta Pasta. Velutti [pictured left, click to enlarge] made his final appearance on the London stage in 1829, and with his retirement, so ended the age of the castrato.
Well, in opera, at least. Meanwhile, in the Sistine Chapel the castrati continued to be members of the choir. There was a temporary halt when the Papal States came under the rule of Napoleon in 1808, but after his removal in 1815, the castrati were reinstated. In 1870, the church officially banned castration but continued to employ whatever castrati that remained in the Sistine Chapel choir.
As chance would have it, a pair of field recorders for Gramophone & Typewriter Company who had come to cut a gramophone cylinder of the Pope's voice in the spring of 1902 happened upon the Sistine Chapel choir and in 1902 managed to make several recordings of it, along with the last known surgical castrato, the only castrato to have been recorded in solo —Alessandro Moreschi (1858-1922). Moreschi was probably castrated around 1865, just five years shy of the ban. While studying music at the Scuola di San Salvatore in Lauro, he was discovered by Gaetano Capocci, who became his teacher. In 1883 he was admitted to the Capella Sistina, after being heard performing the role of Seraph in the oratorio Christus am Ölberge by Beethoven. At that time Moreschi's voice was a high soprano of extraordinary purity and agility, to such an extent that he was nicknamed "Angelo di Roma" and made soloist of the Capella Sistina by the pope. After being made a secretary of the Chapel, Moreschi was promoted to the director of the choir, and two years later appeared singing in the funeral of Italian king Umberto I at the Pantheon.
The seventeen recordings were released on CD in the 1990's. Of them, eight are solo Moreschi. The quality of the recordings is exceptionally low, as the quality of all recordings was at the time. The singing is… interesting. The sound of a castrato is itself so distinct and indescribable that the first word that comes to mind is "freak." It is important to note, however, that Moreschi was, by this point in his life, not a great singer, by any means. He was well past his prime, if he ever had one. His style is not that of the castrati of the Baroque era, but one of the over-emotive early 19th century religious music. Listeners today are often disconcerted with the scoops and excessive portamenti and seemingly intentional register breaks. It's easy to be judgemental, but one must remember that having been castrated never assured a boy of a great voice, and there were always as many bad voices as good, if not more. Moreschi may have simply been a bad singer, but whatever the case, we have been blessed with these indispensable documents—the only recordings ever made of a solo castrato voice. Here is Alessandro Moreschi performing the Bach-Gounod "Ave Maria" and Paolo Tosti's "Preghiera":
But perhaps more interesting is not the solo Moreschi recordings, but those with the chorus. The members of the Cappella Sistina were not credited by name, and little was written about the group as a whole, but the evidence in surviving photos seems to support the idea that there were other older castrati in the choir [click on the photos to view larger versions]. In the chorus photo in the third paragraph, there is a man standing at the left of Moreschi who appears to be the same fellow at the back-right of the group photo in this paragraph. In the signatures photograph, at least one and possibly two of the men besides Moreschi is a castrato; one Giovanni Cesari is labelled "soprano (acuto)." Likewise in the upper chorus photo, at the bottom left, is a man who looks remarkably similar to Domenico Mustafà, another of the last castrati in the Sistine Chapel choir. Furthermore, when listening to the ensemble works on the disc, one can discern the other soprani or contralti that do not sound like falsettists (though there were a few in the choir). This is especially prominent in the Palestrina madrigal for four voices, "La cruda mia nemica."
By March 1913 Moreschi had retired from the Cappella Sistina to his home in Rome, where he spent the rest of his life. He performed on occasion, such as under a mass celebration at the Capella Giulia in 1914. He was also a friend of a German writer Franz Habock, author of the extremely important Die Kastraten und ihre Gesangskunst, who planned to revive the Farinelli repertoire with Moreschi in 1914. However, the grand plan failed to became a reality due to several obstacles on the way—probably the war and the decay of Moreschi's voice, yet Habock himself point out the main reason for the failure: Moreschi, as all the other Capella singers, was simply unqualified of singing the Baroque repertoire in a proper way, as it had become almost impossible to find teachers even remotely connected with the grand tradition of Tosi and Mancini, the teachers of the great castrati of the 18th century.
Regarding Moreschi's appearance Habock had this to say, after seeing him in 1914:
Comments
Perhaps in this great age of Retro the castrato can finally have its comeback.
I agree with Tristan's comment. I am a natural male soprano myself - at least as high as Moreschi's.
For further information about the history of castrati, and our attempts to revive the tradition with natural male sopranos and countertenors, and links, subscribe to the Yahoo email groups castratiandcountertenors, castrati_history, castrati_history2, and castrati_history3 . A few days ago, an article about a brilliant young male soprano, Michael Mancini, was posted on http://www.operatoday.com .
TESTING.