Maddalena Casulana Mezari

The Italian late Renaissance composer Maddalena Casulana Mezari (* uncertain: around 1544 in the province of Siena , Italy ; † unknown) was also a singer , lutenist and teacher of composition . In the years 1566–1586 she published several volumes of 3–5-part madrigals, most of which appeared in Venice. These are considered to be the earliest music prints by a female composer.

Maddalena Casulana (?) Anonymous portrait

Life, travel, work

The date and place of birth as well as the date and place of death of the Maddalena Casulana remained unknown. All we know about her life is that she lived and taught as a composer in different places and gave concerts as a singer and lutenist. The evaluation of old and more recent sources about their appearances in the cities of Vicenza , Venice , Siena , Munich , Verona , Perugia , Brescia , Innsbruck , Florence , Vienna , Ferrara , Milan (list of the places mentioned), as well as about their possible participation in the Accademia Vicentina is not yet complete, and so far there is no unified picture. Maddalena Casulana is believed to be the first woman to make her status as a composer public by reproducing her works through printing . The two volumes of 4-part Madrigali Spirituali reported under her name as the latest in 1591 are lost and therefore apparently cannot be clearly authorized. The portrait attributed to her, which (only) was installed around 1650 within 44 depictions of musicians in the newly established instrument chamber of the Innsbruck Hofburg , has not yet been confirmed. Due to her second name "Mezari", which appears in addition from the 1580s, after the composer had previously published under "Casulana" alone, it is assumed that she has married in the meantime; however, neither the wedding date nor the first name of her husband were known. Her double name is given as "Signora Maddalena Casulana di Mezari" or "Maddalena Mezari detta Casulana Vicentina", the latter on the title of her 3rd volume Madrigals. Occasionally she is only recorded under her 2nd name Mezari.

Her works - all ensemble chants - were printed almost exclusively in Venice; the earliest belong to the collection "Il Desiderio" 1566 and 1567, 1st and 3rd volume, together with works by famous contemporary composers such as Cipriano de Rore and Orlando di Lasso ; Maddalena Casulana was already known as a composer beyond the borders of Italy. She taught a prominent student, the actor, poet and musician Antonio Molino (around 1496–1571), who explicitly referred to her as his composition teacher in 1568 in his printed work I dilettevoli madrigali (Venice 1568).

On February 22, 1568 the Munich court music director Orlando di Lasso performed with his band on the occasion of the wedding of Duke Wilhelm V of Bavaria with Renata of Lorraine, among many other compositions, works by two female composers, these were Catarina Willaert, the daughter of the famous Venetian St. Mark's Basilica - Kapellmeister Adrian Willaert and Maddalena Casulana. According to the testimony of the court musician Massimo Troiano , who experienced the “splendid musical design” of the festival as a singer and recorded it meticulously, she was a “› virtuosissima ‹on the lute”. According to his testimony, Latin motets by the two composers were heard as table music, including Casulana's 5-part work Nil mage iucundum , of which only the text by Nicolò Stopio has survived.

After Casulana's name suffix "Vicentina" , this city was possibly her birthplace or main place of activity. This name first occurs in 1569, after which she was apparently an honorary citizen of Vicenza. From around 1570 Casulana is mentioned as a singer and composer in the chamber music of the Roman-German Emperor Maximilian II in Vienna. However, details about this were not known. This is likely to be a hitherto unknown trace of Casulana's “unknown” decade from 1570, whose information gap is consistently cited in the secondary literature.

Giambattista Crispolti narrates her appearance at a banquet in Perugia in 1582. In August of the same year, an edition of 3-part madrigals published by Angelo Gardano is dedicated to Philippe de Montes . The three-part voice was particularly relevant at the time because of the famous Concerto delle Donne di Ferrara .

In Germany, the name of the composer can be found 160 years later when her first volume Madrigals was advertised in the Musicalisches Lexicon of the Weimar conductor, organist and musicologist Johann Gottfried Walther (Leipzig 1732) with the following entry:

“Casulana (Maddalena) from their composition are on. 1568 in Venice four-part madrigals by Hieron. [Imo] Scoto were printed. s. Draudi Bibl.Class.p. 1628. "

Academic activities

Casulana's work at the Accademia Olimpica (= Accademia Vicentina), which is associated with the famous name of Andrea Palladios and initiated the famous Teatro Olimpico in Vicenza, has been considered by Gabriele Nogalski "at least since the 1580s". Another academic connection seems to have existed with the “Accademia Filarmonica” of Verona, where she gave concerts in 1582/83 (?) And to whose “patron” Mario Bevilaqua dedicated her third madrigal volume. On January 18, 1583 Casulana played at a concert in the Accademia Vicentina. The occasion is unknown. The likelihood of a connection between Casulana and the Academy in Vicenza is corroborated by their possession - at least temporarily - of a portrait of the artist.

Composer

Maddalena Casulana is described several times in the literature as a self-confident, professional composer, also with the fact that she was apparently the first woman to make use of the opportunity to become known through printing. Her collaboration with the Venetian poet and actor Antonio Molino, as well as her own texts, of which Molino set three to music, show that she was in the middle of the discourse about the merging of text and music on the way to " monody ". Further material about this should be found in the dedications to her, for example. Her compositions that have been handed down and that have been secured for her are almost exclusively 3–5-part secular madrigals and almost all of them were published in Venice, the city of early sheet music printing. The anonymous portrait (?) Portrays her as a religious artist with a gaze directed towards the sky.

Madrigals, which promoted the style modern and at the same time the " monody ", the expressive single song, were the musically highest secular art form at that time. It is not known whether Casulana's solo vocal performances, which she herself accompanied with the lute, were arrangements of her own madrigals, or possibly solo compositions that have now disappeared. Such a lecture of the "Casolana famosa" at a banquet in Perugia in 1582 is described in an old source by Giambattista Crispoldi as "cantò al liuto di musica divinamente" (see above).

On August 20, 1582, the publisher Angelo Gardano dedicated a publisher's volume to her with Madrigali a tre (3-part) Philippe de Montes and combined this with the request that she also compose 3-part madrigals. About 10 years later, the three voices of the three singers of the famous Concerti delle Donne from Ferrara made school.

The fact that Casulana was not only welcome as a composer in the male world can already be read in her dedication from 1568, because she justifies the dedication of her first independent volume to Isabella de 'Medici Orsina Il primo libro di madrigali a quattro voci as follows (excerpt):

“[...] to show the world (at least in the form that is granted to me in the profession of musician) the foolish error of men who generously believe of themselves that they alone are masters of high intellectual abilities. And they believe that these skills cannot be equally available in women. "

We conclude from this that, as a composer, she knew difficulties related to her composing as a woman. Nevertheless, a second volume followed madrigals in 1570 and a third in 1583 Il primo libro di madrigali a cinque voci , the volume on whose title she is called "Maddalena Mezari detta Casulana Vicentina", from which it can be concluded that she was now married. In total, over 65 madrigals were published by her.

Her works were also reprinted, such as Il primo libro di madrigali a quattro voci , which had a second edition in 1586, as well as a 3-part madrigal, which is only known in its second edition from 1586.

The Munich wedding

This 14-day glamorous festival of the Bavarian Hereditary Duke Wilhelm V with Renata von Lothringen in February 1568 is treated by Horst Leuchtmann in his book Die Münchener Fürstenhochzeit von 1568 (1980). The original quote from 1568 reads

“On the same evening, during a sumptuous dinner, the famous Orlando di Lasso had a five-part composition by Signora Maddalena Casulana performed alongside other entertainment and wonderful music for confectionery, which was listened to with the utmost care. I cannot let you hear the sound of this great music; [...] this highly talented woman set it [the text] to music, whose high art, character and morality are known to all noble spirits of our happy age. "

Research needs

• The poetic texts she has set to music and her own require examination.
• Likewise Casulana's activities at the academies of Vicenza and Verona.
• The dedication texts to the composer and her own apparently contain further details about her whereabouts and other living conditions.
• The people known to her and their connection to her should be investigated.
• There should be more information about the places of publication and the number of editions.
• The portrait of Casulana has yet to be confirmed.

Works

Printed

• 5 madrigals in the collection / compilation of Il Desiderio , Venice, Girolamo Scotto 1566 and 1567 (after Pendle).
• Il primo libro di madrigali a quattro voci , Venice 1568, dedicated to Isabella de 'Medici Orsina. 2nd edition 1583.
• Il secondo libro di madrigali a quattro voci Venice 1570, dedicated to Francesco Pesaro, mayor of Vicenza (after MGG 1) or the Milanese Don Antonio Londonio (after Grove 2001).
• Il primo libro di madrigali a cinque voci , Ferrara (? After Pendle) 1583, dedicated to Mario Bevilaqua, patron of the Accademia Filarmonica di Verona (after Grove 2001).
• 3-part madrigal in the collection Il Gaudio , Venice 1586, only 2nd edition known.

Lost

• 5-part Latin motet “Nil mage iucundum” , performed in February 1568 as table music at the Munich wedding.

Lost and uncertain attribution

• Madrigali spirituali , 4-part, 2 volumes, catalog entry 1591, quoted in Michiati, Vol. II, IV, V (after Grove 2001 and Pendle).

Modern edition

• Beatrice Pescerelli (Ed.): I Madrigali di Maddalena Casulana. Leo S. Olschki, Florence 1979. With biographical text.

literature

• The New [Norton /] Grove Dictionary of Women Composers. Edited by Julie Anna Sadie and Rhian Samuel. The Macmillan Press Limited, 1994, reprinted 1995, 1996, ISBN 0-333-51598-6 and ISBN 0-393-03487-9 .
• The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians . 2nd Edition 2001, Vol. 5. Like Grove Women. with detailed (sometimes different) information on old and newer literature.
• Robert Eitner Source Lexicon. Graz 1959, vol. 5.
• Beatrice Pescerelli: I Madrigali di Maddalena Casulana . Leo S. Olschki, Florence 1979, with a biographical foreword.
• Karin Pendle, ed .: Women & Music, a History. Indiana University Press, Bloomington & Indianapolis, 1991, ISBN 0-253-34321-6 .
• Linda Maria Koldau : Women - Music - Culture, a manual on the German-speaking area of ​​the early modern period. Böhlau Verlag, Cologne 2005, ISBN 3-412-24505-4 .
• James R. Briscoe ed .: Maddalena Casulana. Historical anthology of music by women. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, Indiana, ISBN 0-253-21296-0 .
• Antje Olivier, Karin Weingartz-Perschel (eds.): Female composers from A – Z. Toccata Verlag für Frauenforschung, Düsseldorf 1988, ISBN 3-9801603-0-0 .
• Johann Gottfried Walther : Musical Lexicon or Musical Library. Neusatz ed. by Friederike Ramm, Bärenreiter, Kassel 2001, ISBN 3-7618-1509-3 , p. 137.
• Music in past and present 1 (1949 ff) article “Mezari” and 2 (personal part 1999 ff) article “Casulana”.
• Marc-Joachim Wasmer: Maddalena Laura Lombardini Sirmen (1745–1818), prima donna of the violin. In: Approach VIII - to seven women composers. ed. by Clara Mayer, Furore Verlag 890, Kassel 1997, ISBN 3-927327-39-5 .
• Massimo Troiano in: Horst Leuchtmann: The Munich princely wedding of 1568. Massimo Troiano, dialogues. Italian German. Verlag Emil Katzbichler, Munich-Salzburg 1980, ISBN 3-87397-503-3 .
• Vittorio Bolcato:  Mezari (De Mezari), Maddalena (Maddalena Casulana). In: Mario Caravale (ed.): Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (DBI). Volume 74:  Messi – Miraglia. Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Rome 2010, pp. 54-56.
• Joseph Willimann: 'Indi non più desio': About renunciation and desire. The madrigals of Maddalena Casulana. In: Musik & Ästhetik 10 (2006) 37 (Jan.), pp. 71-97, ISSN  1432-9425 .

Notes and sources

1. ↑ after Grove Women. 1996.
2. ↑ after Pendle Women 1991, p. 48, also in Ferrara (the volume of 5-part madrigals) and Grove Women also in Brescia (re-edition 1583 of volume I).
3. ^ After New Grove 2001, Grove Woman , Eitner, who concludes from the title of 1583 that she was born in Vicenza and, according to the title of 1582, lived in Venice, Linda Maria Koldau: Vienna p. 159 u. Note 186 and Innsbruck p. 113, MGG 1 and 2, Karin Pendle
4. ^ New Grove. 2001, vol. 5. p. 274, works.
5. ↑ on this: Koldau 2005, p. 113.
6. ↑ Pendle: Women. P. 48.
7. ^ So in Eitner 1959 and MGG 1.
8. ↑ Pendle: Women. 1991, p. 47.
9. ↑ Preface to this, MGG 2, Vol. 5, 2000, Col. 432.
10. ↑ From 1568–1570 he was Kapellaltist of the House of Wittelsbach in Munich and Landshut, s. Horst Leuchtmann: Massimo Troiano p. 429 (in it Massimo Troiano: Dialoge , Venice 1568). According to Koldau 2005, p. 159. MGG 1.
11. ↑ Koldau 2005, p. 159, note 186.
12. ↑ Horst Leuchtmann: Massimo Troiano p. 124 (263). Grove Women. P. 110; MGG 2.
13. ↑ Horst Leuchtmann: Massimao Troiano S. 482nd
14. ^ Female composers from AZ , p. 82; Grove Women , p. 109; MGG 2.
15. ^ Robert Lindell in: Koldau 2005, p. 568.
16. ↑ Grove Woman. P. 110.
17. ↑ MGG 2, Vol. 5, 2000.
18. ↑ See New Grove, 2001.
19. ^ New Grove. 2001.
20. ↑ Dilettevoli madrigali a quattro, libro primo.
21. ↑ See Grove Woman . P. 110 and the specified secondary literature.
22. ↑ after Eitner.
23. ^ Translation from the Italian by Marc-Joachim Wasmer, in: Wasmer: Primadonna der Violin. P. 84, note 16.
24. ↑ Massimo Troiano (1568) in: Horst Leuchtmann: Massimo Troiano p. 124 (263). Translated from the Italian by H. Leuchtmann.

Web links

Accademia Olimpica [1]