While examining diverse archival sources relating to eighteenth-century Italian opera, I have come across references to the practice of singers, composers and theatre agents exchanging information about ‘corde’, ‘tuoni’, ‘virtuoso di cantabile’ and ‘abbilità’. To what were they referring with these words? In this essay, I show that the notes that singers were able to produce were termed ‘corde’ or ‘tuoni’; and that the quality of their voices, including their virtuoso singing capabilities, was designated by the expressions ‘virtuoso di cantabile’ and ‘abbilità’. Additionally, I show that this information was sent by mail to facilitate a composer's work in absentia.Footnote 1
Since the dawn of the genre of opera, composers have often written with individual artists in mind.Footnote 2 When opera troupes worked in close proximity, as they did during the early to mid-seventeenth century,Footnote 3 sending corde was, of course, unnecessary. Sources documenting this practice are therefore more likely to emerge in connection with a later period, a time when singers and composers were ‘divorced from the original act of composition’, that is to say, the eighteenth century – at least in Italy.Footnote 4 But seventeenth-century sources documenting this same practice on the Peninsula, as I will show, have already been uncovered by earlier scholars.
Much of this discourse is bound up intimately with the agency of singers in relation to compositional processes. This broad topic has already been addressed in a number of prominent studies, and I do not propose to cover it here.Footnote 5 Rather, I would like to shed some light on the vocabulary and turns of phrase used when vocal ranges were being discussed in Italy during the mid- to late eighteenth century. I hope that this glimpse might at least serve to facilitate research on eighteenth-century archival sources.
The discussion that follows is in five parts. I start with a survey of previous research on this practice in the seventeenth century, then treat the primary sources relating to the inaugural season at the San Carlo in Naples (1737) and the production of Pulli's Demetrio at Milan's Regio Ducal Teatro (1748–1749). I subsequently turn to the production of an unspecified opera in Milan in 1763, as well as of Demofoonte in Lucca (1765) and L'isola disabitata in Bologna (1768). Other than those relating to Naples, none of these sources has ever been published. But first let us consider some seventeenth-century instances of the aforementioned word usages and practices that relate to them.
Seventeenth-Century Antecedents: Venice (1627, 1665/1666) and Florence (1683)
Certain sources suggesting that seventeenth-century composers, impresarios and singers were familiar with the practice of sending corde have already been considered by musicologists. On 22 May 1627 Claudio Monteverdi, when writing the title role of the aborted Licori finta pazza for Margherita Basile, sent the following letter to Alessandro Striggio:
Et fra poco spero che mandarò qualche cosa alla sig.ra Margherita come principal parte, ma desidererei sapere le corde proprie de la sua voce sino alla sua maggior altezza et bassezza.Footnote 6
And shortly I hope I will be able to send something to Signora Margherita, who will play the title role, but I would like to know more about the notes [‘corde’] of her voice, and what are the highest and lowest notes [she is able to sing].
Evidently, Monteverdi uses the word ‘corde’ metonymically: the principal dictionary sense of the word ‘corde’ refers to ‘a string, of hemp, linen or silk, used for binding’ (‘Corda: filo di canapa, lino, di seta, e simili, rattorte insieme, per uso di legare’),Footnote 7 and the human voice is produced by the vibration of the vocal cords (‘corde vocali’). The step from ‘vocal cords’ to ‘notes that could be sung’, and therefore vocal range, is short. As I will show, the word ‘corde’ appears to have been used in the eighteenth century with the same meaning.
Another seventeenth-century example is from Venice in 1665. One of the regular singers for the impresario Marco Faustini, the castrato Antonio Cavagna, was particularly demanding when negotiating his participation in the 1666 season at the Teatro di San Giovanni e Paolo. Having examined his part, possibly that of Artabano in Doriclea, he wrote to Faustini on 17 October 1665 requesting two additional arias and informing him peremptorily that he expected to sing at Roman pitch – approximately one whole tone lower than the Venetian:
Per altro poi io intendo di cantar sopra li instrumenti della orchestra accordati al giusto tono di Roma, e non più come ho fatto nella Statira, nel Teseo et altri, e questo per esser di maggior vantaggio alla mia voce, e lo dico io hora acciò niuno si lamenti di ciò.
I intend to sing with the instruments tuned to Roman pitch and not as I did in Statira, in Teseo and in other works, because it is better for my voice, and I say it now so that no one will complain about it later.Footnote 8
In another letter, from 14 November 1666, Cavagna complained to Faustini about the range of one of his arias in the 1667 production of Alciade:
La canzonetta che mi manda per agionta mi scusi chi l’à fatta, è per un contralto et non per soprano, et molto diferente dalla maniera del Sig.r Ziani.
[regarding] the canzonetta that you enclosed, excuse me, but who wrote it? It is for contralto, not for soprano, and is very different from Signor Ziani's style.Footnote 9
Cavagna's remarks refer to his vocal abilities and range quite obliquely, especially if compared to Monteverdi's letter of 1627.
A more direct engagement with these issues emerges from the correspondence of the Florentine impresario Luca degli Albizzi. A few years later, on 13 June 1683, Albizzi received a letter from his agent, Paolo Falconieri. His aim was to provide information on the voice of the tenor Giuseppe Canavese, whom he had heard before. Ferdinando de’ Medici was considering him for a post at court, hence the need to know more about Canavese's vocal abilities. Falconieri was quite critical about the singer:
Le ragioni per le quali non mi piace sono: circa al canto, che se bene canta bene, non vi è esquisitezza, e la sua voce agli orecchi miei è in molte corde bella, e in molte no.
The reasons I do not like [Canavese] are the following. As for his voice, yes, he sings well, but there is no subtlety, and to my ears his voice is beautiful on many notes [‘corde’], and on many it is not.Footnote 10
The usage of the term ‘corde’ recalls that from the 1627 letter by Monteverdi. I have not so far been able to find other sources covering the time gap between 1683 and 1737, the date of the first eighteenth-century source examined in this essay; yet the similarities between the case studies relating to both centuries suggest continuity.
Naples: The Inaugural Season at the Teatro di San Carlo (1737)
The first eighteenth-century trace of the practice of sending corde brings us to the inauguration of the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples on 4 November 1737. For the occasion, three operas on Metastasian librettos were produced: Achille in Sciro, La clemenza di Tito and L'Olimpiade, respectively set to music by Domenico Sarro, Nicola Porpora and Leonardo Leo. The prime parti were played by Vittoria Tesi and Anna Maria Peruzzi, also known as ‘La Parrucchierina’.Footnote 11
Benedetto Croce, citing a letter written by the theatre superintendent Erasmo Ulloa Severino, suggests the following turn of events:
Le opere si stavano musicando. La Parrucchierina e la sorella, che non potevano venire prima dell'ottobre, avevano mandato ai maestri Sarro e Leo ‘i loro tuoni ed il più virtuoso di cantabile, che le medesime posseggono!’.Footnote 12
The operas were being set to music. La Parrucchierina and her sister, who could not come [to Naples] before October, had sent to maestros Sarro and Leo ‘their tuoni and the most virtuoso di cantabile they have!’.
Ulloa's sentence seems to suggest that La Parrucchierina (as well as her unnamed sisterFootnote 13) had sent information on the qualities of her voice in writing to the composers. At this point, it is worth explaining the meaning of the word ‘tuoni’ and of the expression ‘virtuoso di cantabile’. The Vocabolario degli Accademici della Crusca, reprinted in Naples during the 1740s, provides the following explanation of the first:
Tuoni. Appresso a’ musici sono i gradi per cui passano successivamente le voci, e i suoni nel salire verso l'acuto, e nello scendere verso il grave colla regolata interposizione de’ semituoni a’ loro luoghi per riempire gl'intervalli maggiori consonanti, o dissonanti.Footnote 14
Tuoni. Term used by musicians. They are the degrees through which voices and sounds successively pass, in ascending toward the high and descending toward the low, with the regulated interposition of semitones at their places to fill the consonant, or dissonant major intervals.
These sources suggest that Ulloa used the term ‘tuoni’ having in mind the notes that La Parrucchierina could sing.
The meaning of the second expression used by Ulloa, ‘virtuoso di cantabile’, is more difficult to evaluate. The Vocabolario degli Accademici della Crusca defines ‘virtuoso’ as follows:
Ciascuna cosa è virtuosa in sua natura, che fa quello, a che ell’è ordinata; e quanto meglio lo fa, tanto è più virtuosa. Onde diciamo . . . del cavallo virtuoso, che corre forte, e molto ecc; diciamo una spada vertuosa, che ben taglia le dure cose, ecc.Footnote 15
Something is defined as virtuoso in its nature, if it does that for which it is meant for; and the better it does it, the more virtuoso it is. Hence we say . . . that a horse is virtuoso, if it runs fast, and a lot, etc.; we say a that a sword is virtuosa, if it cuts hard things well, etc.
Ulloa uses ‘virtuoso’ as a direct object in his sentence, as if it were something that could be ‘sent’ via mail and that a singer could ‘have’. The term ‘cantabile’, further, is rather ambiguous. This is what the Vocabolario degli Accademici della Crusca proposes:
Cantabile. Che può cantarsi.Footnote 16
Cantabile. That [which] can be sung.
Therefore the literal translation of ‘virtuoso di cantabile’ could be ‘something that has strength and that can be sung’. More freely, as we shall see through the examination of other sources, the same expression could be rendered as ‘information on the most virtuoso singing possible’.Footnote 17
It follows that the arias sung by La Parrucchierina in Achille in Sciro and L'Olimpiade should show similarities.Footnote 18 A thorough scrutiny of the musical manuscripts has revealed these affinities (see Example 1). It would not be surprising if the virtuosi di cantabile sent by La Parrucchierina contained fast descending scales running from g2/a2 down to g1/a1. Such practices will, however, be further confirmed by the other sources examined in this essay. The next traces of these customs bring us to the production of Demetrio in Milan's Regio Ducal Teatro (1748).
Comparison between the arias sung by Anna Maria Peruzzi (‘La Parrucchierina’) in Domenico Sarro's Achille in Sciro and Leonardo Leo's L'Olimpiade: (a) Sarro, ‘Del sen gl'ardori’, Achille in Sciro, Act 1 Scene 14, bars 10–11 and 45–47 (Library of the Conservatorio San Pietro a Majella, Naples, 31.3.8, fols 60v–62r); (b) Leo, ‘Tu me da me dividi’, L'Olimpiade, Act 2 Scene 10, bars 8–10 and 18–19 (Badische Landesbibliothek, Karlsruhe, Don Mus.Ms. 1219, pages 252–253)
Milan: The Production of Demetrio (1748) by Pietro Pulli
The production of Demetrio is documented by correspondence exchanged between Pietro Pulli, the maestro hired to set the libretto to music, and an agent of the Regio. Unfortunately, only the letters sent by Pulli – who was at that time in Venice – to Milan's agent have survived. Yet on the reverse side of Pulli's letters, the agent wrote brief notes in connection with his response. The reverse side of the letter sent by Pulli on 13 July 1748 is particularly interesting:
Risposta a 21 agosto: vi mandai il libretto della Zenobia, con le corde della Casarini, Albuzia, Caselli, e Ghiringhella, e che il Manzoli e Amorevoli gliele manderanno loro.Footnote 19
Answer of 21 August: I sent you the libretto of Zenobia, and the corde of Casarini, Albuzia, Caselli and Ghiringhella, and [noted] that Manzoli and Amorevoli will send them to you.
The agent had sent to Pulli the corde of four cast members; another two of them, Manzoli and Amorevoli, would have personally sent theirs to the same maestro. Perhaps these singers were informing Pulli of the notes they were able to sing, so that he could begin composing their arias. This situation recalls that of Naples in 1737, the only difference being that, instead of the term ‘tuoni’, the agent uses ‘corde’.
This idea is further supported by Pulli's response of 24 August 1748:
Questa mattina ò [sic] ricevuto il sentitissimo foglio di vossignoria illustrissima unitamente col libro intitolato La Zenobia, e la notizia delle voci, e abbilità de’ virtuosi.Footnote 20
This morning I received the most heartfelt letter from Your Illustrious Lordship, together with the libretto entitled Zenobia and the information about the voices and abilities of the virtuosi.
Considering this response, it seems likely that Pulli wanted to know more about the vocal ranges of singers (the ‘corde’ they were able to sing) and the vocal styles at which they were more skilful. Ulloa's reference to the ‘virtuoso di cantabile’ comes easily into play. Similarly, these two issues – getting to know more about the vocal range and about the singing abilities of specific singers – appear in the source relating to the 1763 Carnival season at the Regio in Milan.
Milan: A Job Opportunity for Castrato Antonio Perellino (1762–1763)
In late November 1762 the singer Antonio PerellinoFootnote 21 was corresponding with Antonio Greppi, a Milanese businessman who exerted great influence on the Regio.Footnote 22 Greppi was searching for singers to hire for the following years, and Perellino had been recommended by Caterina Gabrielli, one of the most celebrated sopranos of that time.Footnote 23 In the letter that Perellino sent to Greppi on 20 November 1762, he wrote:
Dalla Caterina Gabrielli fui onorato di un suo foglio con dentro altra lettera segnata da vossignoria illustrissima dove rilevo che la detta sig[no]ra Gabrielli si sia interessata p[er] la mia debole persona col propormi nel teatro di Milano è [sic; e] che mediante la sua rac[c]omandazione, lei m'ab[b]ia onorato di sciegliermi [sic] . . . . Risolvo dunque di accettare p[er] li [sic] 300 zecchini è [sic] al[l]og[g]io, conoscendo anche lei che la paga è ben pic[c]ola ma che fare spero che questa farà che molta volta mi daranno di più. Intanto lei desidera sapere se io canto soprano hò [sic; o] contralto, li [sic] dirò che son soprano e le mie corde, come il Manzoli mentre le sue arie mi accomodanno [sic; accomodano] molto.Footnote 24
I was honoured to receive from Caterina Gabrielli a letter with a further letter enclosed, signed by Your Illustriousness, in which I read that the said signora Gabrielli was interested in proposing my humble self for the theatre of Milan, and that through your recommendation, she honoured me by choosing me . . . I resolve therefore to accept [Milan's proposal] for three hundred sequins and lodging . . . In the meantime, you wish to know whether I sing soprano or alto. I will tell you that I am a soprano, and that my ‘corde’ are like [those of] Manzoli; his arias suit me very well.
Evidently, Perellino is informing Greppi of his ‘corde’ and his ‘abbilità’. The singer, by writing that his ‘corde’ correspond to those of Manzoli, implies that he can sing in the same range as this castrato. As regards Perellino's reference to the ease with which he could sing Manzoli's arias, it could be suggested that it might be a further example of a virtuoso di cantabile – or something very similar. Manzoli was one of the most celebrated castratos of the time, and so Perellino's claim that he was capable of effortlessly singing Manzoli's arias might seem over-ambitious.
Perhaps Perellino failed to convince Greppi, because his name does not appear in the 1763 Milanese librettos. But the source attracts attention for Perellino's clarity in describing his voice to Greppi. An even more direct engagement in this sense emerges from the sources pertaining to the 1765 operas in Lucca.
Lucca: News about the 1765 Opera Season
In autumn 1765 the Teatro di Lucca presented productions of works entitled Demofoonte Footnote 25 and Il re pastore.Footnote 26 The season's focus was the soprano Lucrezia Aguiari.Footnote 27A letter sent by a certain Giovanni Conti to Greppi on 21 August 1765, and therefore presumably written during the rehearsals of the first opera, informs Greppi about Aguiari's voice. Perhaps Greppi had asked Conti for information on the singers active in Lucca in order to evaluate the possibility of hiring some of them for Milan:
Abbiamo p[er] prima donna di musica una tale Aguajari [sic] ferrarese detta Bastardella, ch’è veramente un portento; questa sola è capace di reggere un'opera, ed è assolutamente migliore della famosa Gabrielli, essendo la voce perfettissima in tutte le sue corde, avendone 4 o 6 di più della detta Gabrielli.Footnote 28
We have as our prima donna a certain Aguajari from Ferrara, known as Bastardella, who is truly a marvel; she alone is capable of carrying an entire opera by herself, and she is absolutely better than the famous Gabrielli, her voice being perfect in all its ‘corde’, having four or six more than the said Gabrielli.
Clearly, this source is important in so far as it links the term ‘corde’ to the notes that a singer was able to sing. In Conti's words, the ‘corde’ could indeed be numbered. The phrase ‘avendone 4 o 6 di più della detta Gabrielli’ in all probability means that Aguiari's vocal range was greater than that of Gabrielli. This idea is further reinforced by the comparison of the two singers’ voices. As documented by Mozart in 1770, Aguiari's voice reached c4, an extraordinarily high note.Footnote 29 A comprehensive examination of the arias performed by Gabrielli that are available online, instead, suggests that La CoghettaFootnote 30 could sing only up to d3; that is to say, exactly ‘sei corde’ less than La Bastardella (Example 2).Footnote 31
(a) Extract from a notation of ‘pitches and passages’ (‘Töne und Passagen’) sung by Lucrezia Aguiari, as recorded by W. A. Mozart in a letter of 24 March 1770 to his sister (reproduced in Georg Nikolaus von Nissen, Biographie W. A. Mozarts (Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel, 1828), 186); (b) The range of Caterina Gabrielli, as sung in Padua in 1758 (excerpt from an aria composed for her by Baldassarre Galuppi, ‘In te spero, o sposo amato’, Demofoonte, Act 1 Scene 2, bars 66–70 (Sächsische Landesbibliothek – Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek, Dresden Mus.2973-F-8, page 45))
As argued by Anthony Pryer, some passages from Mozart's Fra cento affanni, k88, that were sung by Aguiari reflect those that Mozart had heard and noted down in Parma in 1770.Footnote 32 This suggests that sending corde to composers in absentia was not the only way in which information on singers’ voices could be gathered. When maestros and singers had the chance to meet beforehand, there was obviously no need to exchange correspondence on this point. Yet, given that singers and composers often did not meet in person before rehearsals, it could be suggested, although with some uncertainty, that communicating via mail was the easiest choice – at least in eighteenth-century Italy.
On the one hand, the Lucca source definitively links the term ‘corde’ to the meaning ‘notes that could be sung’. On the other, it does not mention the reason for this practice. The most probable situation sees singers sending out their corde and abbilità to facilitate the maestros’ work in composing. This is confirmed by the sources investigated in the following section, which covers the 1768 production of Traetta's L'isola disabitata in Bologna.
Bologna: L'isola disabitata, an azione by Tommaso Traetta (1768)
On 26 April 1768 the Teatro del Pubblico in Bologna produced an azione drammatica per musica: the one-act L'isola disabitata, with music by Tommaso Traetta.Footnote 33 On 15 March 1768 a court functionary named Giacomo Marulli sent a letter to Greppi in Milan. Marulli needed information on the voice of Daniela Mienci, the singer who played the role of Silvia in L'isola disabitata.Footnote 34 Mienci was indeed in or near Milan during early 1768, because she was performing in the Carnival operas in nearby Lodi at that time.Footnote 35 Marulli's letter reads as follows:
Essendo venuta la risulta da Vienna di doversi fare la cantata in questo teatro la sera dei 26, però la priego avvisarne cotesta sig[no]ra Mienci per darle l'inclusiva e dirli, che si prepari ad essere qui subito dopo Pasqua. Mi faccia grazia di individuarmi la qualità della voce di essa virtuosa p[er] potere informarne il sig[nor]e Trajetta, che me lo richiede. E subito che avrò la parte composta ò [sic] in porzione ò [sic] tutta la spedirò alla med[esi]ma antecedentem[en]te.Footnote 36
Since we have received the news from Vienna that the cantata is to be performed in this theatre on the evening of the 26th, I beg you to inform signora Mienci so that she may be prepared to be here immediately after Easter [that year, 3 April 1768]. Please be so kind as to tell me the quality of the voice of this virtuosa so that I may be able to inform signore Trajetta [sic], who asks me to do so. And as soon as I have the part composed, either in portion or in full, I shall send it to the same beforehand. And with all esteem I confirm myself.
Among the most interesting matters here is the reference to Traetta explicitly requesting information about Mienci's voice. The next primary source, a letter sent by a certain Count Boccadiferro in Bologna to Greppi in Milan on 22 March 1768, dealing with Mienci, further reinforces that idea:
Essendosi portato il sig[nor]e c[onte] Marulli p[er] suoi affari alla corte di Toscana, ed avendomi incaricato de[’] suoi affari costì, sono ora a pregarla a volere avere la bontà d'indicarmi le corde della sig[no]ra Mienci acciò le possi [sic] notificare al signor Trajetta ma[est]ro di cappella ad effetto di ultimare la composiz[io]ne della musica p[er] la nota cantata, che si deve rappresentare qui in Bologna il divisato giorno dei 26 dell'entrante aprile. In seguito poi le saprò dire quando debba fare partire a cotesta volta la detta virtuosa.Footnote 37
Count Marulli having gone to the court of Tuscany owing to some business of his, and having entrusted me with his affairs here, I now ask you to have the goodness to indicate to me the ‘corde’ of signora Mienci so that I may notify them to signore Trajetta [sic], maestro di cappella, for the purpose of completing the composition of the music for the well-known cantata, which is to be performed here in Bologna on the next 26 April. Later on, I shall be able to tell you when the said virtuosa is to leave for this city.
The sentence ‘for the purpose of completing the composition of the music’ suggests, again, that the practice of sending information about an interpreter's vocal range and abilities was a common method to which eighteenth-century composers, impresarios and singers resorted.
Conclusion
In sum, I can reasonably say that, at least in eighteenth-century Italy, singers, composers, impresarios and their agents sent out written information on the notes that specific interpreters were able to sing, their vocal abilities and their capacity for virtuosic singing, for the benefit of an absent composer. Relevant primary sources include expressions such as ‘corde’, ‘tuoni’, ‘abbilità’ and ‘virtuoso di cantabile’. ‘Corde’ and ‘tuoni’ were used to indicate the notes that a singer was able to sing. Getting to know this information, for a composer, was equivalent to becoming aurally familiar with the vocal ranges of his interpreters. By contrast, ‘abbilità’ and ‘virtuoso di cantabile’ appear to be expressions linked to the specific vocal skills of a particular singer.
Previous research has revealed that this practice was already taking place in Italy during the seventeenth century. However, the increased number of sources stemming from the following century suggests that this practice grew as maestros, impresarios and singers became ‘divorced from the original act of composition’. Further primary evidence about the sending of corde may yet emerge. In the meantime, I hope to have demonstrated that it is possible to locate such information, and to have offered useful tools for ongoing research.
