Why controversy raged around the singer-castrat Moreschi - the only eunuch whose voice was recorded for posterity

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

History has left many memories of famous castrated singers and their delightful voices. Alas, we cannot travel back to those distant times and hear singing, for example, Farinelli or Senesino, but audio recordings of the voice of another such vocalist, Alessandro Moreschi, have survived to this day. And even if his singing is imperfect, he became famous for the fact that he fell to become the last professional castrato singer, and even leave the next generations with a live recording of his voice.

Usually, future operatic castrates were subjected to the castration procedure at the age of six or nine, when it was already clear that the boys had good vocal abilities. Moreschi underwent this manipulation in infancy - he was born in 1858 with a congenital inguinal hernia, and the doctors of that time recommended castration as the only way to save the child's life. In general, in the case of Alessandro, no one could have known in advance whether he would become the owner of an amazing voice, like the great Farinelli, or not.

Moreschi grew up at a time when the fashion for castrated singers was already on the decline. Parents gave their son to the chapel of the Madonna del Castagno. Then he was noticed by the famous musician and teacher Nazareno Rosati and was admitted to the singing school of San Salvatore in Lauro, later studied under the organist and church composer Gaetano Capocci. And in 1883 he entered the service in the Sistine Chapel. There he worked for three decades. Interestingly, at the beginning of the last century, Pope Pius X forbade the use of castrates in the Sistine Chapel, but Moreschi was allowed to remain as a conductor and soloist.

Contemporaries have repeatedly criticized Moreschi's vocals, believing that he is far from his famous predecessors. Nevertheless, it was impossible not to admit that Alessandro was unique for his time - it was not the singing of a countertenor or a vocalist with an unusually high falsetto, not a woman or a child, but a castrato singer. For example, the author of a scientific study about such singers, Angus Hariot, wrote that "Christ on the Mount of Olives" performed by Moreschi "was delightful", noting that the singer could hit the notes of the third octave, reaching to the "e". But those audio recordings that have survived to this day also do not cause universal unconditional admiration.

I must say, Moreschi was not lucky not only with natural data, but also with vocal education. The fact is that in 1870, when he was only 12 years old, the castration of boys for "vocal" purposes was officially banned; all the singers of such a plan who could pass on their experience and secrets of skill to Moreschi either died or retired at that time. The work in the Papal Chapel did not give great vocal prospects, but only allowed to perform church music of the 19th century.

In the Sistine Chapel, Moreschi rose to the rank of soloist and conductor, but in the last years of his life he sang less and less. In 1914, he was offered to perform works from Farinelli's repertoire, but he refused, because he understood that he was no longer able to do it. Moreski died in 1922 (aged 63) from pneumonia.

Audio recordings of Moreschi's voice were made by representatives of the Gramophone company in 1902-1904, when he, already a professor, worked as a soloist and choral conductor of the Sistine Chapel. In total, about two dozen such recordings were made, including the famous "Ave Maria" by Bach and "The Crucifixion" by Rossini on a phonograph. At that time, Alessandro was already over forty, and for a castrato singer this is a respectable age (early "vocal aging" in such cases is not uncommon, because delicate ligaments, which in fact remained childish, are exposed to the powerful respiratory apparatus of an adult man).

The imperfection of singing, which connoisseurs of vocal art note in the recorded voice of the eunuch vocalist, may also be due to the fact that before the recording Moreschi was very worried. He even had to rewrite one of the performed works a year later.

However, in the place of the singer, any contemporary musician would have been embarrassed when he first saw in the chic Vatican hall a strange machine with three sockets attached to it from the input recording pipe and knowing that now this contraption would record his voice “for posterity”.

Professionals, listening to Moreschi's recordings, find flaws in the performance and note that he lacked vocal technique, and someone thinks his timbre is not very pleasant. However, it must be admitted that his voice fascinates from the first notes - at least by the fact that he is not like anything …

Read also about what was the price for crystal clear voices centuries ago.