The Castrato: Reflections On Natures And Kinds (ernest Bloch Lectures)
by Martha Feldman /
2015 / English / Kindle, EPUB
25.2 MB Download
The Castrato
The Castrato is a nuanced exploration of why innumerable
boys were castrated for singing between the mid-sixteenth and
late-nineteenth centuries. It shows that the entire foundation of
Western classical singing, culminating in bel canto, was birthed
from an unlikely and historically unique set of desires, public
and private, aesthetic, economic, and political. In Italy,
castration for singing was understood through the lens of
Catholic blood sacrifice as expressed in idioms of offering and
renunciation and, paradoxically, in satire, verbal abuse, and
even the symbolism of the castrato’s comic cousin Pulcinella.
Sacrifice in turn was inseparable from the system of
patriarchyinvolving teachers, patrons, colleagues, and
relativeswhereby castrated males were produced not as nonmen, as
often thought nowadays, but as idealized males. Yet what
captivated audiences and composersfrom Cavalli and Pergolesi to
Handel, Mozart, and Rossiniwere the extraordinary capacities of
castrato voices, a phenomenon ultimately unsettled by
Enlightenment morality. Although the castrati failed to survive,
their musicality and vocality have persisted long past their
literal demise.
is a nuanced exploration of why innumerable
boys were castrated for singing between the mid-sixteenth and
late-nineteenth centuries. It shows that the entire foundation of
Western classical singing, culminating in bel canto, was birthed
from an unlikely and historically unique set of desires, public
and private, aesthetic, economic, and political. In Italy,
castration for singing was understood through the lens of
Catholic blood sacrifice as expressed in idioms of offering and
renunciation and, paradoxically, in satire, verbal abuse, and
even the symbolism of the castrato’s comic cousin Pulcinella.
Sacrifice in turn was inseparable from the system of
patriarchyinvolving teachers, patrons, colleagues, and
relativeswhereby castrated males were produced not as nonmen, as
often thought nowadays, but as idealized males. Yet what
captivated audiences and composersfrom Cavalli and Pergolesi to
Handel, Mozart, and Rossiniwere the extraordinary capacities of
castrato voices, a phenomenon ultimately unsettled by
Enlightenment morality. Although the castrati failed to survive,
their musicality and vocality have persisted long past their
literal demise.