Caffarelli

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Gaetano Majorano (Caffarelli)

Caffarelli (real name Gaetano Majorano; born April 12, 1710 in Bitonto near Bari , † January 31, 1783 in Naples ) was a famous Italian opera singer ( soprano - castrato ).

Life

Gaetano Majorano received his first music lessons from an unknown Maestro Caffaro (not identical to Pasquale Cafaro ), who directed the church choir in his hometown and was the godfather of his stage name. At the age of about nine, Caffarelli allegedly had himself castrated at his own request and became a student of Nicola Porpora , who was considered the best singing teacher in Italy , at the Conservatorio Sant'Onofrio in Naples . The Legend gradually formed a single page with scale exercises (Solfeggien) the only teaching materials, and Caffarelli should otherwise have done as a long day-in, day-out to repeat five years these exercises. Then Porpora dismissed him with the words: “Go there, my son. I can't teach you anything anymore. You are now the greatest singer in Italy and the whole world! ” Such a sheet by Porpora's hand does indeed exist, but his students are more likely to have used it for daily singing before class. In addition, Porpora is said to have always reacted quite indignantly when he was asked about the teaching method he had used at Caffarelli.

Caffarelli received his first engagement in Rome , where he made his debut in the 1726 Carnival in the opera Valdemaro by Domenico Sarro . In the years that followed, Caffarelli took the stages of the Iberian Peninsula by storm, performing several times with his great rival Farinelli . After his departure from the opera stage, Caffarelli was undisputedly the most famous singer in Italy - as his teacher Porpora had predicted.

In 1738 he accepted an invitation to the Haymarket Theater in London , directed by Georg Friedrich Handel , where he took part in the world premieres of Handel's operas Faramondo and Serse . For Caffarelli, Handel wrote the famous aria “Ombra mai fu” from Serse (generally known as “Largo von Handel”), but Handel found little taste in Handel's music (and Handel, for his part, did not like Caffarelli's interpretation). Since he didn't like England itself either, he returned to his home country after the end of the season. It must be noted, however, that even Farinelli, shortly before Caffarelli came to England, could no longer achieve any great success, which was largely due to the bad operas he had to sing, but also to the fact that the British were interested in the Italian opera seria generally began to decline and they increasingly turned to the “domestic” music theater. Caffarelli is also said to have only agreed to travel to London after it became clear that his greatest rival Farinelli would stay in Spain and not return to England. It is also interesting that Handel managed to get Caffarelli to sing his performance aria “Ombra mai fu” at the very beginning of the opera, since otherwise the most important singer does not appear on stage in the first few minutes. Contrary to what is usual in opera houses today, there was always a great deal of unrest in the auditorium, especially in the first few minutes, which is why the important arias of the “superstar” were of course not placed in this period. In addition, Caffarelli was very angry with any disturbance from the audience while he was singing.

Caffarelli; Caricature by Pier Leone Ghezzi

Caffarelli's unstoppable career was repeatedly accompanied by scandals, which, however, did not seriously damage his reputation. A significant incident from the year 1739 makes this clear: Caffarelli fought in a church with a colleague who believed he was offended. He was charged with blasphemy , but by the Bourbon King Charles III. pardoned. The king wanted Caffarelli to embellish his younger brother's wedding celebrations in Madrid with his singing. Caffarelli traveled to Spain for a year with the alto Vittoria Tesi . After his return he concentrated his appearances mainly on Naples, interrupted by a guest performance in Vienna in 1749. There he suffered the only significant failure of his career when the young tenor Anton Raaff managed to outdo the established star in the audience's favor . The librettist Metastasio reported to Farinelli, not without glee, of the failure of Caffarelli in Vienna. According to Metastasio, Caffarelli apologized for his unsuccessful performance by saying that the presence of the high-ranking people had confused him so much that he was unable to concentrate on his singing. Unsettled by this unaccustomed fiasco, the successful Caffarelli displayed a very modest behavior. Metastasio wrote to Farinelli that he would not recognize Caffarelli at the moment.

In 1753 Caffarelli made a guest appearance in Paris. A golden snuff box that Louis XV gave him as a gift . was handed over, he rejected as unworthy of himself. He then received a three-day residence permit signed by the king himself - a discreet request to leave the country within this period. However, whether this story is true is debatable.

After a guest performance in Lisbon , which came to an abrupt end in the great earthquake of 1755 , Caffarelli finally settled in his homeland. From his considerable fortune he bought a large estate near Otranto (which earned him the title of Duke of San Donato) and a city palace in Naples. The Latin inscription “Amphion Thebas, ego Domum” (“Amphion Thebes, I built this house”) is an allusion to the legend of the Greek singer Amphion , who built the city wall of Thebes by moving the stones with his singing alone . (An anonymous wag she added later: "Ille cum, tu sine" - "He with you without".) In 1768 he was in Alceste in Ebuda of Giovanni Paisiello his farewell performance. After that, he sang at charity events for many years and also generously supported the needy in the city. He was buried in the Capuchin monastery of Sant'Efremo Vecchio .

meaning

Caffarelli is considered to be one of the greatest singers who have ever entered the opera stage - in an era when great singing personalities often significantly influenced the style of the works written for them. Among the arias that were written for him by the most famous composers of his time are some of the most spectacular vocal pieces in all of music literature. In the aria "Per trionfar pugnando", which closes the 2nd act of the opera Arianna e Teseo by Giuseppe di Majo (Naples 1747), the coloratura, for example, screw up to d '' ', with the voice still having the brilliance of four Trumpets in the orchestra must outshine. (A copy of the score of this opera is in the library of the Conservatorio di San Pietro a Majella in Naples, call number I-Nc 28.3.3; a digitized version can be viewed at www.internetculturale.it). On the other hand, a melody as simple and solemn as "Se mai senti spirarti sul volto" from La clemenza di Tito by Gluck (recently recorded on CD by Cecilia Bartoli) shows that his art cannot have been limited to pure larynx acrobatics.

Role directory (selection)

Below is a list of operas in the premieres of which Caffarelli took part, including the role he played in them (if known):

literature

  • Alfredo Giovine: [Article] Caffarelli. In: Music in the past and present . (1 CD-ROM) DirectMedia, Berlin 2004, ISBN 3-89853-160-0 .
  • Hubert Ortkemper: Caffarelli. The life of the castrato Gaetano Majorano, called Caffarelli (= Insel-Taschenbuch. Volume 2599). Insel-Verlag, Frankfurt a. M. 2000, ISBN 3-458-34299-0 .
  • Hubert Ortkemper: Angels against their will. The world of the castrati; another opera story. dtv, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-423-30468-5 .
  • Margriet de Moor: The virtuoso. Hanser, Munich / Vienna 1994, ISBN 3-446-17869-4 .
personal data
SURNAME Caffarelli
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Majorano, Gaetano
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian opera singer (castrato)
DATE OF BIRTH April 12, 1710
PLACE OF BIRTH Bitonto at Bari
DATE OF DEATH January 31, 1783
Place of death Naples