Haute-contre
The haute-contre (plural hautes-contre) was the primary French operatic tenor voice, predominant in French Baroque and Classical opera, from the middle of the seventeenth century until the latter part of the eighteenth century. History This voice was predominantly used in male solo roles, typically heroic and amatory ones, but also in comic parts, even ''en travesti'' (see apropos the portrait reproduced below and representing Pierre Jélyotte made up for the female title role of Rameau's '' Platée''). Lully wrote 8 out of 14 leading male roles for the voice; Charpentier, who was an haute-contre himself, composed extensively for the voice-part, as did Rameau and, later, Gluck. The leading ''hautes-contre'' of the '' Académie Royale de Musique'' that created the main roles of Lully's operas, at the end of the seventeenth century, were Bernard Clédière (who started off as a ''taille'', a lower Tenor voice type) and Louis Gaulard Dumesny. Notable ''hautes-contre'' of the ei ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Countertenor
A countertenor (also contra tenor) is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range is equivalent to that of the female contralto or mezzo-soprano voice types, generally extending from around G3 to D5 or E5, although a sopranist (a specific kind of countertenor) may match the soprano's range of around C4 to C6.A sopranist is a term used to describe a countertenor whose vocal range is so high it is equivalent to that of a soprano; however, this term is widely used falsely. Countertenors often are baritones or tenors at core, but only on rare occasions do they use their lower vocal range, instead preferring their falsetto or high head voice. The nature of the countertenor voice has radically changed throughout musical history, from a modal voice, to a modal and falsetto voice, to the primarily falsetto voice which is denoted by the term today. This is partly because of changes in human physiology and partly because of fluctuations in pitch. The term first cam ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Joseph Legros
Joseph Legros, often also spelt Le Gros, (7 September or 8 September 1739 – 20 December 1793) was a French singer and composer of the 18th century. He is best remembered for his association with the composer Christoph Willibald Gluck and is usually regarded as the most prominent ''haute-contre'' of his generation, though his acting is reputed to have been mediocre. Biography Legros was born at Monampteuil, Laon. After initial training as a choirboy, when his voice broke Legros developed the voice of a ''haute-contre'', a type of French high tenor that was typically used for the heroic male lead in French operas of the period. Legros made his début at the Paris Opéra in 1764 in a revival of Mondonville's '' Titon et l'Aurore'' and became the leading ''haute-contre'' at the Opéra, a status he held until his retirement in 1783, caused in part by his increasing obesity. Legros began his operatic career singing the principal roles in revivals of the operas by Jean-Baptiste ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Tenor
A tenor is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. The tenor's vocal range extends up to C5. The low extreme for tenors is widely defined to be B2, though some roles include an A2 (two As below middle C). At the highest extreme, some tenors can sing up to the second F above middle C (F5). The tenor voice type is generally divided into the ''leggero'' tenor, lyric tenor, spinto tenor, dramatic tenor, heldentenor, and tenor buffo or . History The name "tenor" derives from the Latin word '' tenere'', which means "to hold". As Fallows, Jander, Forbes, Steane, Harris and Waldman note in the "Tenor" article at ''Grove Music Online'': In polyphony between about 1250 and 1500, the enor was thestructurally fundamental (or 'holding') voice, vocal or instrumental; by the 15th century it came to signify the male voice that sang such parts. All other voices were normal ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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François Poirier
François () is a French masculine given name and surname, equivalent to the English name Francis. People with the given name * Francis I of France, King of France (), known as "the Father and Restorer of Letters" * Francis II of France, King of France and King consort of Scots (), known as the husband of Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots * François Amoudruz (1926–2020), French resistance fighter * François-Marie Arouet (better known as Voltaire; 1694–1778), French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher *François Aubry (other), several people * François Baby (other), several people * François Beauchemin (born 1980), Canadian ice hockey player for the Anaheim Duck *François Blanc (1806–1877), French entrepreneur and operator of casinos *François Boucher (other), several people *François Caron (other), several people * François Cevert (1944–1973), French racing driver * François Chau (born 1959), Cambodian American actor ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rossini
Gioachino Antonio Rossini (29 February 1792 – 13 November 1868) was an Italian composer who gained fame for his 39 operas, although he also wrote many songs, some chamber music and piano pieces, and some sacred music. He set new standards for both comic and serious opera before retiring from large-scale composition while still in his thirties, at the height of his popularity. Born in Pesaro to parents who were both musicians (his father a trumpeter, his mother a singer), Rossini began to compose by the age of 12 and was educated at music school in Bologna. His first opera was performed in Venice in 1810 when he was 18 years old. In 1815 he was engaged to write operas and manage theatres in Naples. In the period 1810–1823 he wrote 34 operas for the Italian stage that were performed in Venice, Milan, Ferrara, Naples and elsewhere; this productivity necessitated an almost formulaic approach for some components (such as overtures) and a certain amount of self-borrowing. Duri ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition resulted in more than 800 works of virtually every genre of his time. Many of these compositions are acknowledged as pinnacles of the symphonic, concertante, chamber, operatic, and choral repertoire. Mozart is widely regarded as among the greatest composers in the history of Western music, with his music admired for its "melodic beauty, its formal elegance and its richness of harmony and texture". Born in Salzburg, in the Holy Roman Empire, Mozart showed prodigious ability from his earliest childhood. Already competent on keyboard and violin, he composed from the age of five and performed before European royalty. His father took him on a grand tour of Europe and then three trips to Italy. At 17, he was a musician at the Salzburg court b ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Tenore Contraltino
The tenore contraltino is a specialized form of the tenor voice found in Italian opera around the beginning of the 19th century, mainly in the Rossini repertoire, which rapidly evolved into the modern 'Romantic' tenor. It is sometimes referred to as ''tenor altino'' (or ''contraltino'') in English books. Vocal features It is a type of tenor voice with a compass not much wider than that of the coeval baritenor, but able to sustain far higher tessiture. It means that the basic range remained substantially the classic one, from C3 to C5: only the best baritenors, however, were able to reach up to such heights and used to pass anyway to the falsettone (or strengthened falsetto) register about G4; for tenori contraltini, on the other hand, the threshold of the passage to the falsettone register rose two or three semitones, and they could so easily reach C5 but often up to E5, or even, exceptionally, to F5. The real difference, however, consisted in the tessitura, or the pitch range th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Angelo Amorevoli
Angelo Maria Amorevoli (16 September 1716 – 15 November 1798) was a leading Italian tenor in Baroque opera. Biography Angelo Amorevoli began singing in opera seria when he was just thirteen: in 1729 he sang in revivals of the musical dramas, ''Amore e gratitudine'', probably by Flavio Carlo Lanciani, and '' Ottone in villa'' by Antonio Vivaldi. The following year he was on the stage in Rome for Porpora’s operas ''Mitridate'' and ''Siface'', and in Venice for Hasse’s ''Dalisa''. From 1731 to 1735 he took part in major operatic productions in Turin, Milan, and other towns of northern Italy. From 1736 to 1740 he moved to Naples, where he took part in eleven premières, one of which was Sarro’s ''Achille in Sciro'', the drama that inaugurated the Teatro di San Carlo on 4 November 1737. In 1739 he traveled to Vienna, where he attracted a lot of attention, primarily with his interpretation of Vivaldi's ''Feraspe''. On 26 December 1740 he took part in the inauguration o ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Jérôme Lalande
Joseph Jérôme Lefrançois de Lalande (; 11 July 1732 – 4 April 1807) was a French astronomer, freemason and writer. Biography Lalande was born at Bourg-en-Bresse (now in the département of Ain) to Pierre Lefrançois and Marie‐Anne‐Gabrielle Monchinet. His parents sent him to Paris to study law, but as a result of lodging in the Hôtel Cluny, where Delisle had his observatory, he was drawn to astronomy, and became the zealous and favoured pupil of both Delisle and Pierre Charles Le Monnier. Having completed his legal studies, he was about to return to Bourg to practise as an advocate, when Lemonnier obtained permission to send him to Berlin, to make observations on the lunar parallax in concert with those of Lacaille at the Cape of Good Hope. The successful execution of this task obtained for him, before he was twenty-one, admission to the Academy of Berlin, as well as his election as an adjunct astronomer to the French Academy of Sciences. He now devoted himself ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pitch (music)
Pitch is a perceptual property of sounds that allows their ordering on a frequency-related scale, or more commonly, pitch is the quality that makes it possible to judge sounds as "higher" and "lower" in the sense associated with musical melodies. Pitch is a major auditory attribute of musical tones, along with duration, loudness, and timbre. Pitch may be quantified as a frequency, but pitch is not a purely objective physical property; it is a subjective psychoacoustical attribute of sound. Historically, the study of pitch and pitch perception has been a central problem in psychoacoustics, and has been instrumental in forming and testing theories of sound representation, processing, and perception in the auditory system. Perception Pitch and frequency Pitch is an auditory sensation in which a listener assigns musical tones to relative positions on a musical scale based primarily on their perception of the frequency of vibration. Pitch is closely related to frequency, bu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Airs De Cour
The ''air de cour'' was a popular type of secular vocal music in France in the late Renaissance and early Baroque period, from about 1570 until around 1650. From approximately 1610 to 1635, during the reign of Louis XIII, this was the predominant form of secular vocal composition in France, especially in the royal court. Features The first use of the term ''air de cour'' was in Adrian Le Roy's ''Airs de cour miz sur le luth'' (Book on Court Tunes for the Luth), a collection of music published in 1571. The earliest examples of the form are for solo voice accompanied by lute;Buelow, 2004, p. 156 towards the end of the 16th century, four or five voices are common, sometimes accompanied (or instrumental accompaniment may have been optional); and by the mid-17th century, most ''airs de cour'' were again for solo voice with accompaniment. Beginning in 1608, ''airs de cour'' were often taken from ''ballets de cour'', a form of ballet which was quickly becoming popular at the French cou ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |