For Every Music Lover: A Series of Practical Essays on MusicMoore, Aubertine Woodward
History
For Every Music Lover: A Series of Practical Essays on Music
Moore, Aubertine Woodward
Music -- History and criticism
Madame Malibran was said to be equally at home in any known school of
her time. Mozart and Cimarosa, Boieldieu and Rossini, Cherubini and
Bellini were all grasped with the same sympathetic comprehension. Sontag
was her rival, Pasta was yet in the height of her fame, but no contrasts
whatever dimmed the glory of Malibran. A rare personal charm added to
her artistic graces. Mr. Chorley describing her, in his recollections,
said that she was better than beautiful, insomuch as a "speaking Spanish
human countenance by Murillo is ten times more fascinating than many a
faultless face such as Guido could paint." When her death was announced,
in 1836, Ole Bull, who had known her well, exclaimed: "I cannot realize
it. A woman with a soul of fire, so highly endowed, so intense. How I
wept on seeing her as Desdemona! It is not possible she is dead."
Pauline Garcia, thirteen years younger than her remarkable sister, and
with a voice similar in quality, also did justice to her father's
rigorous discipline and became famous. She married M. Viardot, opera
director and critic, and after a brilliant career as a singer, gave long
and valuable service as a vocal teacher in Paris. She remained in the
full tide of her activity until she was long past the allotted
threescore years and ten. It is an interesting fact that Madame Mathilde
Marchesi, author of a noted vocal method, 24 books of Vocalises, a
volume of reminiscences, and other works, and once famed as a singer,
is only five years younger than Madame Viardot-Garcia, but at
seventy-six is still teaching--still shining as an authority on the art
of song. Singers seem often to have been long-lived. In truth, there is
that in music which is life-giving.
A songstress whose name will always be mentioned in the same breath with
that of the tenor Mario, who became her husband, and with whom she
toured the United States in 1854, was Giulia Grisi. She was born in
Milan in 1812, made her debut at sixteen, and had an undisputed reign of
over a quarter of a century. Her voice, a pure soprano of finest
quality, brilliant and vibrating, spanned two octaves, from C to C. She
possessed the gift of beauty, and was said to unite the tragic
inspiration of Pasta with the fire and energy of Malibran. A favorite
role with her was that of the Druid priestess in "Norma." Her delivery
of "Casta Diva" was said to be a transcendant effort of vocalization.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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