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Carestini
Giovanni Carestini (13 December 1700 in Filottrano, near Ancona – 1760 in Filottrano) was an Italian castrato of the 18th century, who sang in the operas and oratorios of George Frideric Handel. He is also remembered as having sung for Johann Adolf Hasse and Christoph Willibald Gluck. Career Giovanni Carestini was born on 13 December 1700 in Filottrano. He was the son of Marco Felice Carestini and Vittoria Costantini. He was baptized two days after his birth by Don Nicola Gentiloni, provost of the Church of Santa Maria Assunta in Filottrano. In that occasion it was given the name Giovanni Maria Bernardino. The godfathers of his baptism were Felice Lancioni and Olimpia Felice Gentiloni, wife of Alessandro Gentiloni, a noble man of Filottrano. Since he was a child he had an exquisite and sweet voice. Carestini's career began in Milan in 1719, patronised at the time by the Cusani family (hence the alternative name Cusanino). He sang for Alessandro Scarlatti in Rome in 1721. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Giovanni Carestini
Giovanni Carestini (13 December 1700 in Filottrano, near Ancona – 1760 in Filottrano) was an Italian castrato of the 18th century, who sang in the operas and oratorios of George Frideric Handel. He is also remembered as having sung for Johann Adolf Hasse and Christoph Willibald Gluck. Career Giovanni Carestini was born on 13 December 1700 in Filottrano. He was the son of Marco Felice Carestini and Vittoria Costantini. He was baptized two days after his birth by Don Nicola Gentiloni, provost of the Church of Santa Maria Assunta in Filottrano. In that occasion it was given the name Giovanni Maria Bernardino. The godfathers of his baptism were Felice Lancioni and Olimpia Felice Gentiloni, wife of Alessandro Gentiloni, a noble man of Filottrano. Since he was a child he had an exquisite and sweet voice. Carestini's career began in Milan in 1719, patronised at the time by the Cusani family (hence the alternative name Cusanino). He sang for Alessandro Scarlatti in Rome in 1721. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arianna In Creta
''Arianna in Creta'' ("Ariadne in Crete", HWV 32) is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel. The Italian-language libretto was adapted by Francis Colman from Pietro Pariati's ''Arianna e Teseo'', a text previously set by Nicola Porpora in 1727 and Leonardo Leo in 1729. Performance history The opera was first given at the King's Theatre in London on 26 January 1734 and then presented in a revised version with dances added for Marie Sallé at Covent Garden Theatre on 27 November of the same year. As with all Baroque opera seria, ''Arianna in Creta'' went unperformed for many years, but with the revival of interest in Baroque music and historically informed musical performance since the 1960s,''Arianna in Creta'', like all Handel operas, receives performances at festivals and opera houses today. Among other performances, ''Arianna in Creta'' was staged by the London Handel Festival in 2014 and performed in concert by the Handel Festival, Halle in 2018 Roles Sy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ariodante
''Ariodante'' ( HWV 33) is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel. The anonymous Italian libretto was based on a work by Antonio Salvi, which in turn was adapted from Canti 4, 5 and 6 of Ludovico Ariosto's ''Orlando Furioso''. Each act contains opportunities for dance, originally composed for dancer Marie Sallé and her company. The opera was first performed in the Covent Garden Theatre, London, on 8 January 1735. ''Ariodante'' opened Handel's first season at Covent Garden and successfully competed against the rival Opera of the Nobility, supported by the Prince of Wales. Handel had the tacit and financial support of the King and Queen and, more vocally, of the Princess Royal. The opera received 11 performances during its premiere season at Covent Garden. Like Handel's other works in the ''opera seria'' genre, ''Ariodante'', despite its initial success, fell into oblivion for nearly two hundred years. An edition of the score was published in the early 1960s, from ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christoph Willibald Gluck
Christoph Willibald (Ritter von) Gluck (; 2 July 1714 – 15 November 1787) was a composer of Italian and French opera in the early classical period. Born in the Upper Palatinate and raised in Bohemia, both part of the Holy Roman Empire, he gained prominence at the Habsburg court at Vienna. There he brought about the practical reform of opera's dramaturgical practices for which many intellectuals had been campaigning. With a series of radical new works in the 1760s, among them '' Orfeo ed Euridice'' and '' Alceste'', he broke the stranglehold that Metastasian '' opera seria'' had enjoyed for much of the century. Gluck introduced more drama by using orchestral recitative and cutting the usually long da capo aria. His later operas have half the length of a typical baroque opera. Future composers like Mozart, Schubert, Berlioz and Wagner revered Gluck very highly. The strong influence of French opera encouraged Gluck to move to Paris in November 1773. Fusing the traditions ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Demofoonte (Gluck)
''Demofoonte'' is a dramma per musica or opera in 3 acts by composer Christoph Willibald Gluck. The work uses an Italian language libretto by Pietro Metastasio. The opera premiered on 6 January 1743 at the Teatro Regio Ducale in Milan. Roles Revivals The first modern performance of the opera took place at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna, Austria on November 23, 2014. The opera was conducted by Alan Curtis (harpsichordist) Alan Curtis (November 17, 1934July 15, 2015) was an American harpsichordist, musicologist, and conductor of baroque opera. Born in Mason, Michigan, Curtis graduated from studies at the University of Illinois, and received his PhD in 1960 with a ..., featured his Il Complesso Barocco as well as Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen in the primo uomo role of Timante. References {{Authority control Operas 1743 operas Italian-language operas Operas by Christoph Willibald Gluck ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Athalia (Handel)
''Athalia'' ( HWV 52) is an English-language oratorio composed by George Frideric Handel to a libretto by Samuel Humphreys based on the play ''Athalie'' by Jean Racine. The work was commissioned in 1733 for the Publick Act in Oxford – a commencement ceremony of the University of Oxford, which had offered Handel an honorary doctorate (an honour he declined). The story is based on that of the Biblical queen Athaliah. ''Athalia'', Handel's third oratorio in English, was completed on 7 June 1733, and first performed on 10 July 1733 at the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford. The ''Bee'' (14 July 1733) reported that the performance was "performed with the utmost Applause, and is esteemed equal to the most celebrated of that Gentleman's Performances: there were 3700 Persons present". ''Athaliah'' was first given in London on 1 April 1735 at Covent Garden theatre. Dramatis personae Synopsis Athalia, daughter of King Ahab of Israel and Queen Jezebel, had been married to Jehoram, King of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alcina
''Alcina'' ( HWV 34) is a 1735 opera seria by George Frideric Handel. Handel used the libretto of ''L'isola di Alcina'', an opera that was set in 1728 in Rome by Riccardo Broschi, which he acquired the year after during his travels in Italy. Partly altered for better conformity, the story was originally taken from Ludovico Ariosto's ''Orlando furioso'' (like those of the Handel operas ''Orlando'' and ''Ariodante''), an epic poem. The opera contains several musical sequences with opportunity for dance: these were composed for dancer Marie Sallé. Performance history ''Alcina'' was composed for Handel's first season at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden in London. It premiered on 16 April 1735. Like the composer's other works in the opera seria genre, ''Alcina'' fell into obscurity; after a revival in Brunswick in 1738 it was not performed again until a production in Leipzig in 1928. The Australian soprano Joan Sutherland sang the role in a production by Franco Zeffirelli in wh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Artaserse (Vinci)
''Artaserse'' is an opera (''dramma per musica'') in three acts composed by Leonardo Vinci to an Italian libretto by Metastasio. This was the first of many musical settings of Metastasio's most popular libretto. Vinci and Metastasio were known to have collaborated closely for the world premiere of the opera in Rome. This was the last opera Vinci composed before his death, and also considered to be his masterpiece. It is known among Baroque opera enthusiasts for its florid vocal lines and taxing tessituras. It premiered during the carnival season on 4 February 1730 at the Teatro delle Dame in Rome. As women were banned from the opera stage in Rome in the 18th century, all the female roles in the original production were taken up by castrati. However, subsequent 18th-century productions outside Rome included women in the cast.Martha Feldman, ''Opera and Sovereignty'', Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009, 249. ''Artaserse'' continued to be popular for a while after Vinci's deat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Castrato
A castrato (Italian, plural: ''castrati'') is a type of classical male singing voice equivalent to that of a soprano, mezzo-soprano, or contralto. The voice is produced by castration of the singer before puberty, or it occurs in one who, due to an endocrinological condition, never reaches sexual maturity. Castration before puberty (or in its early stages) prevents the larynx from being transformed by the normal physiological events of puberty. As a result, the vocal range of prepubescence (shared by both sexes) is largely retained, and the voice develops into adulthood in a unique way. Prepubescent castration for this purpose diminished greatly in the late 18th century. Methods of castration used to terminate on the onset of puberty varied. Methods involved using opium to medically induce a coma, then submerging the boy into an ice or milk bath where the procedure of either severing the vas deferens (similar to a vasectomy), twisting the testicles until they atrophied, or comp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johann Adolph Hasse
Johann Adolph Hasse (baptised 25 March 1699 – 16 December 1783) was an 18th-century German composer, singer and teacher of music. Immensely popular in his time, Hasse was best known for his prolific operatic output, though he also composed a considerable quantity of sacred music. Married to soprano Faustina Bordoni and a friend of librettist Pietro Metastasio, whose libretti he frequently set, Hasse was a pivotal figure in the development of '' opera seria'' and 18th-century music. Early career Hasse was baptised in Bergedorf near Hamburg where his family had been church organists for three generations. His career began in singing when he joined the Hamburg Oper am Gänsemarkt in 1718 as a tenor. In 1719 he obtained a singing post at the court of Brunswick, where in 1721 his first opera, ''Antioco'', was performed; Hasse himself sang in the production. He is thought to have left Germany during 1722. During the 1720s he lived mostly in Naples, dwelling there for six or seven ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Opera
Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a librettist and incorporates a number of the performing arts, such as acting, scenery, costume, and sometimes dance or ballet. The performance is typically given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble, which since the early 19th century has been led by a conductor. Although musical theatre is closely related to opera, the two are considered to be distinct from one another. Opera is a key part of the Western classical music tradition. Originally understood as an entirely sung piece, in contrast to a play with songs, opera has come to include numerous genres, including some that include spoken dialogue such as '' Singspiel'' and '' Opéra comique''. In traditional number opera, singers employ two styles of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constituent states, Berlin is surrounded by the State of Brandenburg and contiguous with Potsdam, Brandenburg's capital. Berlin's urban area, which has a population of around 4.5 million, is the second most populous urban area in Germany after the Ruhr. The Berlin-Brandenburg capital region has around 6.2 million inhabitants and is Germany's third-largest metropolitan region after the Rhine-Ruhr and Rhine-Main regions. Berlin straddles the banks of the Spree, which flows into the Havel (a tributary of the Elbe) in the western borough of Spandau. Among the city's main topographical features are the many lakes in the western and southeastern boroughs formed by the Spree, Havel and Dahme, the largest of which is Lake Müggelsee. Due to its l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
