Read more
Informationen zum Autor A Professor of Singing at the Royal Academy of Music, Nicholas Clapton's 20-year career as a counter-tenor has seen him particularly involved in performing the repertoire of the great castrati. In 2006 he presented a television documentary on the castrato voice for BBC 4, and in the same year he also curated the hugely successful 'Handel and the Castrati' exhibition at the Handel House, London. Klappentext A unique biography of the last castrato singing in the Sistine Chapel choir. Zusammenfassung In his own lifetime Alessandro Moreschi (1858-1922) came to be known as the 'Angel of Rome,' he was one of the last surviving castrato singers of the Vatican choir, and the only one of the castrati whose voice survives in any recording. The ethereal, haunting quality of his voice hints at why this extraordinary sound was so highly prized for centuries in the papal basilicas and opera houses of Europe.The tradition became established in Italy in the 16th century when Pope Clement VIII gave it his sanction. By the 17th century the castrati had moved onto the secular operatic stage, where they were feted as the 'pop stars' of their day. Few 'normal' singers male or female, came close to matching their fame and success. But, by the 19th century their continued existence had become an embarrassment, and when Moreschi joined the Sistine Chapel in 1883, there were only six castrati left in the choir, and by 1903 they were officially no more.The strange and lonely life of Alessandro Moreschi was lived in the shadows of great events and great institutions, his personality glimpsed only by inference and illusion.
