Joel Figen <natural@w...> wrote:
> But on the subject of castrati, which has come up quite a bit
> recently, what do we really know about them, other than the
> range of their voices and (sometimes) the parts that were
> written for them? Perhaps there are contemporary writings that
> say more?
Dear Joel, here's a good starting point:
http://www.mpae.gwdg.de/~kopp/disc/index4.html
> Today, they're really an extinct species, for all practical
> purposes. No living person has ever seen or heard one.
This is not true, there are people who are alive now who were alive when
the castrati were still singing in Rome. There is even a recording.
Also, there are many cases of men who have hormonal imbalances who end
up with unchanged voices. I have heard a recording of a castrato, and it
sounded to me like a tenorino with a preserved upper head voice.
The male singer in the film "Dangerous Liasons" (do Nascimento) was a
hormonal castrato. Remember also that hormones and the upper extension
associated with them are not synonymous: some castrati lost their upper
ranges, while intact men sometimes keep it. Why? it is because it is the
neurological change which occurs *as a result* of testosterone levels
which changes the voice - not the hormone itself. Brief blips or dips in
testosterone (produced not only in the testes) at a critical point in
development can ruin a castrato's voice or give an intact man a
brilliant career.
Most countertenors report that they never lost the upper extension when
their voices dropped (most begin as boy sopranos or altos). I don't
believe it is a manufactured sound that is artificially trained - it is
simply preserved from boyhood. Though the root chest voice is lower in
most countertenors than those of the castrati (there a few tenorino
countertenors out there, like Mera), I suspect the upper extension is
the same mechanism (as opposed to falsetto), at least for the more
accomplished countertenors.
> So how can we know that they "sounded male" or "looked like men"
> or "acted like men?" My intuition tells me that they would end
> up looking like large, soft boys, but, then again, I have no
> experience to base that on.
They were smooth-skinned, but they were very tall, since the lack of
testosterone prevent calcification of their bones (they tended to be
rich and pretty well fed too). No beards, but a commanding stage
presence due to height and large rib cages. They sounded male inasmuch
that boys sound different from girls, I guess.
> Beyond that, and most importantly, what do we know about how
> they sang? What technique they used might be at times inferred
> from the parts they sang, to some degree, maybe, but what they
> really sounded like seems like quite a mystery. And there may
> not have been just one sound - perhaps there were several or
> many Fäche - if that word applies to the period - that a
> castrato voice might grow into.
You can probably find clip on the internet of Moreschi, the last
castrato. His technique is not representative of Farinelli's but the
quality of basic voice can tell you a lot. Definitely masculine
sounding, but like a 33 record played 45. Most castrati were
sopranos, though many of the most celebrated were altos (their voices
tended to lower with age, probably due to the slow effects of trace
testosterone). They were known for their lungs, so probably above
average for the time in voice size, though that doesn't mean much by
today's "helden-" standards.
-Tako
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