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Milly Jones
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« on: 21:42:03, 05-09-2008 » |
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Did anyone else watch this tonight on BBC4? If not, do look out for the repeat. Absolutely fascinating programme. They were endeavouring to recreate the sound of the castrati voice via technology, it not being possible any other way. Counter tenors are not the same, nor are falsettos, nor are women obviously. They finished up by blending a boy treble with an extremely high tenor. They're still working on the sound of course.
I love the power and purity of the highest register when sung by males. They had a young male soprano on, who by some biological freak hit puberty normally, but his larynx and vocal chords only partially developed so he retained the highest boy soprano notes. He won't call himself a counter tenor but says as he's several notes higher he's a male soprano.
At the end, they had four people singing, a mezzo, a counter tenor, a boy treble and this male soprano. The boy and the soprano both moved me to tears. They sounded really beautiful.
Strange how some things reach your soul.
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We pass this way but once. This is not a rehearsal!
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Milly Jones
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« Reply #1 on: 22:00:54, 05-09-2008 » |
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Oh come on! Surely somebody else watched it?  I want to talk about it. Go on - I'll be your best friend.  They had a lovely baroque chamber orchestra led by Pavlo Beznosiuk, who I really admire. I think high male voices seem to be a minority taste, but what a wonderful sound! |
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We pass this way but once. This is not a rehearsal!
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Ron Dough
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« Reply #2 on: 22:05:32, 05-09-2008 » |
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I'll be recording the repeat on BBC 4 at 02:40 tomorrow morning, Mills.
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Reiner Torheit
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« Reply #3 on: 22:10:16, 05-09-2008 » |
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Sadly I can't get BBC TV channels no-way, no-how, where I am. Not even for ready roubles. Which is a pity, as I have a particular interest in castrati just at the moment, in connection with forthcoming stuff in my schedule. (No, not the "unkindest cut of all" - before Martle and Tommo suggest it  ) Of course, the synthesised voice thing is a fascinating project, an idea of what the real castrato sound might have been? But it still doesn't solve the problem of how to cast Handel, Vivaldi, Bononcini etc operas today. What do we think about that? |
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"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
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harmonyharmony
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« Reply #4 on: 22:18:07, 05-09-2008 » |
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I think that I posted about this when it first aired (can't remember when - it may have even been over on tOP).
It made me annoyed because it's so inconsistent. One minute they're criticising Moreschi because he hasn't been trained in the 'School of Farinelli' then they're synthesising their own version because it sounds more like they think it should sound, without any of the characteristics of the 'School of Farinelli'. The final process seemed so thoroughly based on intuition and prejudice that all of the carefully constructed 'logic' that went before was inevitably hollow. IMO.
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'is this all we can do?' anonymous student of the University of Berkeley, California quoted in H. Draper, 'The new student revolt' (New York: Grove Press, 1965) http://www.myspace.com/itensemble |
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Milly Jones
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« Reply #5 on: 22:24:40, 05-09-2008 » |
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However logical they try to be it is only ever going to be guess work. I was impressed by how they went about it. They were trying to pinpoint a "different" sound to anything we know these days. Maybe if this Hadron Collider works according to plan and they find the Higgs Boson and time travel will be possible, then we can go back and have a listen to the real thing!  |
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We pass this way but once. This is not a rehearsal!
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Reiner Torheit
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« Reply #6 on: 22:27:54, 05-09-2008 » |
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Fair point, although how much was left of the "School of Farinelli" (1705=1782) by Moreschi's time is a rather open question. I'm rather sceptical about these "Schools of" things - they are usually a Licence To Print Money off the back of someone's name, by someone who may have been involved with the original in the most peripheral of ways - or not at all. Viz the "Lee Strasberg Stanislavsky Method", which has very, very few points of contact with what Stanislavsky actually taught.
Bonus Trivia Question: what was the last opera with a role written expressly for a castrato?
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"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
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Milly Jones
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« Reply #7 on: 22:32:46, 05-09-2008 » |
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Guillaume Tell, Rossini, 1824?
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We pass this way but once. This is not a rehearsal!
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harmonyharmony
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« Reply #8 on: 22:43:50, 05-09-2008 » |
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Fair point, although how much was left of the "School of Farinelli" (1705=1782) by Moreschi's time is a rather open question.
I think that was their point. Moreschi was trained as a singer in the Vatican (IIRC) not at the theatre. Also the recordings that survive are not of a castrato in his prime. I've found this but it doesn't touch on the programme. I know that I was in Durham when I watched it (I was ironing) but I thought I posted about it afterwards... I'll have a scout around. |
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'is this all we can do?' anonymous student of the University of Berkeley, California quoted in H. Draper, 'The new student revolt' (New York: Grove Press, 1965) http://www.myspace.com/itensemble |
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Reiner Torheit
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« Reply #9 on: 22:50:10, 05-09-2008 » |
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Guillaume Tell, Rossini, 1824?
There's one from a year later, different composer - and it's a male lead role. |
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"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
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Milly Jones
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« Reply #10 on: 22:51:53, 05-09-2008 » |
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Ok. Give in. Please tell (and can you be quick because I'm going to bed in a minute and I want to know beforehand).
Thanks.
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We pass this way but once. This is not a rehearsal!
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perfect wagnerite
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« Reply #11 on: 22:53:11, 05-09-2008 » |
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Guillaume Tell, Rossini, 1824?
There's one from a year later, different composer - and it's a male lead role. Armando in Meyerbeer, Il Crociato dell'Egitto |
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At every one of these [classical] concerts in England you will find rows of weary people who are there, not because they really like classical music, but because they think they ought to like it. (Shaw, Don Juan in Hell)
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Reiner Torheit
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« Reply #12 on: 23:04:23, 05-09-2008 » |
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Armando in Meyerbeer, Il Crociato dell'Egitto
 ... is the correct answer! But aside from being trivia fun, it also shows that the operatic castrato was a moribund tradition by the middle of the C19th - and any "school" of operatic castrato singing died with it. |
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« Last Edit: 23:06:08, 05-09-2008 by Reiner Torheit »
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"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
- Leon Trotsky, "My Life"
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Kittybriton
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« Reply #13 on: 00:32:11, 06-09-2008 » |
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However logical they try to be it is only ever going to be guess work. I was impressed by how they went about it. They were trying to pinpoint a "different" sound to anything we know these days. Maybe if this Hadron Collider works according to plan and they find the Higgs Boson and time travel will be possible, then we can go back and have a listen to the real thing! I sincerely hope nobody tries mucking about with time travel. Things can get/are/will be/were so impossibly complicated. And why do people always look at the possibility of travelling back into the past (without antisepsis, antibiotics, anaesthesia &c.) instead of travelling forward into the future? What about the possibility that time is circular and the safest way to reach the past is by going past GO and collecting $200? Is it time for my medicine yet? |
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Click me -> About meor me -> my handmade storeNo, I'm not a complete idiot. I'm only a halfwit. In fact I'm actually a catfish. |
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MT Wessel
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« Reply #14 on: 01:03:44, 06-09-2008 » |
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.....I think high male voices seem to be a minority taste, but what a wonderful sound! Dear Milly. Well, I could not agree more. It was certainly better than most of the bollocks served up at the Proms 2008. Regards MT Scrotum. (retired)  ps. Apologies for the above adolescent drivel. It's no excuse but I'd 'ad a few by 01:30 hours .... |
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« Last Edit: 20:54:32, 10-09-2008 by MT Wessel »
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lignum crucis arbour scientiae
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