Customer Reviews

Cecilia Bartoli: Sacrificium

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Another daring undertake by superdiva Cecilia Bartoli, this time literally resurrecting very obscure and extremely difficult arias sung by some of the most famous castrati in the XVIIIth Century. Of course she is not the first to record a whole album with this kind of material, but this one stands out for its rarity and extreme demands regarding breath control, coloratura display and expressive utterance. Apparently all the pieces but one in the first disc of this two-CD special edition are world premiere recordings and some are very fine indeed, others could have remained forgotten without any great loss. Bartoli sings all of them with her trademarked enthusiasm (sometimes too much of a good thing), bravely and exhibiting mostly impressive coloratura, but the sound is not always good, and sometimes to my ears quite unpleasant. There is no way we can be sure how they sounded when sung by the castrati, but I don't think they produced some of the sounds heard here. At one point, with no disrespect, it seems like a caricature of a hen trying to sing. The bonus disc, with three better known arias is far more pleasing to the ears. I'm happy I bought the disc and I will be coming back to some of its tracks often. Others could be interesting to explore a bit further. The rest, well, could have remained gathering dust. Some things are best forgotten. So much worthy repertoire out there and life being so short...

PS. The 2 discs are housed in a beautifully produced and quite thick book, as we have come to expect from Bartoli releases, this one being the most lavish yet. With plenty of information in an illustrated castrati dictionary in three languages (no Spanish, although ironically the record has been produced "with the generous support" -it says at the back- of Junta de Castilla y León), a good essay, a full libretto of arias sung and lots of pictures of Bartoli, or to be exact of her head attached (via Photoshop) to kind of classical marble sculptures, the point of which escapes me.

"There I heard the famous thing from Italy, it looks from all the world like a man, though they say it is not. The voice to be sure is neither man's nor woman's but it is more melodious than either; and it warbled so divinely that while I listened I thought myself in paradise". Lydia Milford, 18th century opera goer, after hearing the castrato Tenducci sing.

At long last, Bartoli, who spurred the gold rush to baroque excavations, produces the album dedicated to the opera idols that entranced the 18th century. No audience can be in a greater state of excitement than hers.

This repertoire is spirited, and captures the exuberance as well as the decadence of the castrato music style. Bartoli asserts this is the most difficult music yet she has ever recorded. This is indeed the case. Bartoli is once again back in her medium, and does not disappoint. Her execution is dynamic and virtuosic.

The arias d'agilita are Bartoli's greatest stunts, and prove her extraordinary vocal athleticism. She is the vocal matador of the 21st century. She rides high on famous war-horses of the baroque era which she has festooned and adorned with lavishly embroidered vocal treatments. No furore is indomitable enough that she can't tame. Her bravuras are florid at the exultant top of bliss. It is difficult to imagine how a castrato could have possibly topped her execution.

The album cadence reaches its zenith in "cadro, ma qual si mira" not just for the amazing show of singing prowess but also for the instrumental figurations that the music sets to the text. Here she brings it on. Her melismas are hypnotically raised to circling patterns and whipped to lung bursting lengths. Her singing is fluent, and just as a note is about to run its course, she ricochets it back into life and feisty scala trillatas that end with the same force as they begin. No wonder arias like "cadro" have been vaulted for hundreds of years. ..They are almost impossible! In the same category is also "son qual nave", another famous war-horse that she has been contemplating for a while. Here the astounding messa di voce of her other version found in YouTube is missing; but her attention to the nuances of the ornate passages, and the finesse with which she bounces off the notes in the da capo more than make up for it. The aria "Chi Temea Giove" is perhaps another concerto for larynx, but also exemplifies the excess that made the castrati go out of style. This aria has the works: thunder, horns, more thunder, boisterous orchestration, burst and sprints of rapid coloratura, and yet all this pomp does not amount to more than a vain display of vocalism. Music like this might have signaled not just the obsolescence of itself but disuse of its singers, the castrati.

The pathetic airs have the quicksand and risky pitfalls for a mezzo, even like Bartoli. Their emotional pathos was written and tailored for and by a castrato whose range negotiated effortlessly the low contralto to the high soprano. Excluding "usignolo sventurato", these arias require the lyrical rigor of Pergolesi's Stabat Mater except that here the singer has to do it all by herself in handling the two registers. Though Bartoli strives to reach the voluptuous, warmer, deeper tones, her sweet victory is just as elusive as the battle that never conquers. Nonetheless, hers is a tour de force not to be missed.

Considering the subject matter of this album, the cover is artistically wild but so were the castrati and the audiences' fascination with their androgyny. In an ironic twist of history, these super stars, who fulfilled the church's God-sent ban on songstresses, heralded the supremacy of the soprano voice. They pioneered the grand roles of emperors, warriors, goddesses, and heroines, and ultimately the first burlesque as drag queens. In the end, and just as God draws straight with crooked lines, secular opera raised its curtains to women who in turn seized these heroic roles dressed as drag kings, and the era of the prima donna was dawned. From Cuzzoni to Bartoli, the legacy of the castrati lives on, and through their sacrificium, the beauty of their last breath endures the test of time.

How does one even begin to review such an album as this? With the recording industry in basically a shambles, little attention paid to serious classical vocalists, this has been, so far, a year of remarkable releases for which this one goes to the top of a very distinguished pile.

Bartoli has crossed a line most unique here in sharing her magnificent obsession with the castrati of the Italian baroque. The very title of the album itself is awe inspiring and thought provoking. While the very notion of castration is abhorrent and screams against nature without it some of the most amazing, most beautiful music ever composed would have most likely never been composed. Sacrificium is about an apt a name for this project as there could possibly be.

Through 15 selections, Bartoli - brilliantly partnered by Il Giardino Armonico and Giovanni Antonini - takes us on a voyage - a journey of remarkable musicmaking that is exhilarating as it is exhausting, as joyous as it is tragic and as intellectually stimulating as it is emotional. We begin the journey an aria by the nearly forgotten Porpora, Come nave in mezzo all'onde, a virtuostic exercise that shows almost every baroque trick compacted into a whirlwind lasting just 4 minutes. Bartoli sails through with an energy that is matched by the spirited ensemble and what a thrill it is to hear brass instruments play with this kind of fierce "to the devil" kind of tone and energy. Thrilling seems too gentle a word for this kind of performance.

Immediately things settle back down to earth only to rise upwards again in an entirely different direction as Bartoli and the musicians offer an inspired reading of the prayer Profezie, di me diceste from Caldara's "Sedecia." The final line "Let the moment that ends my days bring everlasting peace," captured with a sound that is both captivating and heartfelt. Bartoli shows us (again) that she can hold us, can dazzle us and move us with music of such quiet gentility every bit as she can with the coloratura showpieces. Her range in this music is never less than astonishing and while her top remains bright and tightly coiled, her singing from the lower voice has never been more attractive as can be heard in these slower arias.

Throughout this set Bartoli captures our imagination and spirit and instantly transports us back centuries going to one of the most exciting - and dangerous - eras in music history. Her trills, roulades, pinpoint accuracy, sense of line, attention to details both musical and textual reveal a commitment that is never less than total and what a supreme joy it is to spend time with this set. The album is fiercely and attractively packaged, its two CDs wedged on either side of 150+ pages of essays, notes, photographs both disturbing and stunning, including the 100 page "Castrato Compendium" - an alphabetically listed mini-encyclopedia of all things castrati.

Typically I would be hard pressed to pick a favorite moment from so extraordinary a set, but having now listened to it several times - at least for the time being - will nominate Porpora's aria ""Parto, ti lascio o cara" from his 1732 opera "Germanico in Germania." One of the slower paced arias (with a fierce, short-burst of a "B" section), it is as beautiful and perfectly sung a piece of music as I can ever recall hearing.

Lovers of baroque opera, of the beauty of the human voice as well as those fascinated by undiscovered musical treasures should all have good reason to rejoice. The sacrifice has been made, and we're all the richer for it.

p.
[...].

I am not fond of opera and I am particularly not fond of sopranos, but the singing on Cecilia Bartoli's Sacrificium album has absolutely captivated and mesmerized me. The power and range of her voice in these pieces that were written for the "female voice in a male's body" is incredible.

Her compassionate and respectful approach to this music and her understanding and acknowledgement of the sacrifices that were made by the boys and men who originally sang the music is an aspect of this album that I found so appealing.

The pictures and the biographies of the most famous Castrati is most interesting and has educated me in a subject that I was previously only peripherally aware of.

This has become one of my favorite albums and I listen to it frequently.

Bartoli, with her unique instrument, artistry and musicanship, transposes us to an epoch that gave us a human voice of unparalelled beauty that came out of cruelty. There are no castrati recordings but only written impressions of their sound. Countertenors have been singing castrato, but I find their timbre monochromatic and tedious. Countertenors are trained to sing in faked head voice-falsetto. Their vocal cords look like the vocal cords of a grown man unless testosterone deficient or born with a woman's vocal cords, which a freak of nature. The pitch of the voice is determined by the length and thickness of the vocal cords. Castration arrests the developement of the vocal cords, and a man will have a woman's voice. Bartoli's scholarly and phenomenal vocal contribution, with this issue, has given us a God-sent gift to cherish for ever. A mezzo-soprano will remain the closest to a castrato's voice, and no one can do better than Cecilia Bartoli. Bravo!

Constantine A. Papas
El Paso, Texas

Cecilia Bartoli is that rare musician who combines intelligence, vocal artistry, passion, and contagiously spirited stage presence. Her service to the community of musical historians has few matches and she is a consummate artist in bringing carefully selected programming to her audiences. This CD/book gives us a rich history not only of the concept of the Castrati musicians but also shares much of the personal and professional lives of these 'chosen ones'. What results is the world premiere recording of eleven castrato arias in addition to three legendary castrato arias - including the well known 'Ombra mai fu' by Handel.

To call this recital dazzling would only be a partial description of this recording. For all the pyrotechniques contained in these treacherously difficult arias there is an equal amount of genuine beauty of tone and of communication. Bartoli delivers this genre with compete ease and control while introducing her audience to a series of arias rarely performed on stages today. It is a joy to relax and hear the ravishing beauty of her voice and her collaboration with Giovanni Antonini conducting the Il Giardino Armonico. It is an additional gift to learn the careful history of the Castrati, a well-written history and dictionary that includes photographs even of the instruments used for castration of the boys whose lives were to be devoted to the musical stage. All of this together is an incredible achievement given to us by one of the most gifted artists before us today. It is bound to become a collector's item. But purchase it for the endless moments of beauty and spectacle of the human voice as gathered and performed by Cecilia Bartoli. Grady Harp, December 09

If you are a Bartoli devotee, and/or a lover of music written for the castrato voice, this album is for you.

Me... I'm not a great lover of the sound of Cecilia Bartoli nor of Il Giardino Armonico on `every' track, BUT the CD is still a MUST HAVE. On a couple of tracks the playing seems too `full-blown'... and if I could find one word to express what I least like about Bartoli's singing it is her 'earnestness'... a tendency for the frenetic, overdone, and as another reviewer wrote "her trademarked enthusiasm (sometimes too much of a good thing)"... but this is personal, since I concede Bartoli has great range and coloratura skill etc etc.

Much of the music on this disc was originally sung by the castrati stars Farinelli (7 arias) and Cafarelli (3 Porpora arias... Porpora was his teacher): there are two arias composed by Carl Heinrich Graun (from "Demofoonte" 1746, and "Adriano in Siria" 1746) performed by Porpora's pupils Salimbeni and Porporino. The arias are wonderful, ranging from `rage' and `heroic' arias with plenty of fireworks and vocal leaps, `simile' arias mimicking butterflies and nightingales, to reflective, introspective laments or prayers. There are many highlights on the album, include the beautifully expressive farewell aria "Parto, ti lascio, o cara" from Porpora's "Germanico in Germania."

Exceptionally, all but one of the 12 arias on the disc are world premiere recordings. That exception is "Nobil onda" from Nicola Porpora's "Adelaide" 1723. Bartoli was pipped at the post by Karina Gauvin's recent album "Porpora Arias". Incidentally, this is another valuable album (A MUST HAVE) as it too has many premiere recordings. It also helps to express my earlier point about the sound of Il Giardino Armonico... a sound I think is occasionally too harsh, full, and heavily instrumental. Il Complesso Barocco's introduction in "Nobil onda" with harpsichord seems to rest more easily with these ears of mine!!! These world premieres, and the focus on different composers but largely two singers, makes it a tight, well thought out and well-researched album. The `book' and `sleeve' (rather than jewel case) format house the CDs, so it's a nice presentation, and the information and index/dictionary included are a useful though not academic read. As others note, there are 2 CDs. The second CD includes 3 `exemplary' arias by Riccardo Broschi, Haendel, and Giacomelli, originally sung by Farinelli and Cafarelli. In the case of Haendel's "Ombra mai fu," this aria has been covered by almost everyone! Why not make it a proper double album with more premiere arias?... it would have been a magnificent opportunity!

P.S. For those interested in Farinelli, don't look past Vivica Genaux's "Arias for Farinelli." She has an amazing, unique mezzo soprano sound. For music sung by Farinelli at the end of his career, also have a listen to Max Emanuel Cencic's "Domenico Scarlatti: Cantate d'amour" and "Domenico Scarlatti: Cantatas," both put out by Capriccio. The music by D. Scarlatti was written at the end of his career, 1740s. Farinelli sung these at the Spanish court, having arrived there in 1737. It is thought that many of the texts in these cantatas were penned by Metastasio, and written especially for Farinelli. Cencic is a countertenor, though he considers himself a mezzo-soprano. He has a wonderful voice with much depth, and though not full of pyrotechnics (Farinelli was then in his 40s) the cantatas on both albums are very rich and expressive. Total different sound to Bartoli's album of course, just thought it was worth mentioning if you are exploring other albums!

I heard an interview with Cecilia Bartoli on NPR about two months ago and was fascinated by it. She spoke of the castrati singers who I knew a little about because of a course available on opera done by "The Teaching Company" by Robert Greenberg. (I'm new to opera but it's possible to learn much in little time between courses like this, inexpensive downloads and live HD opera at theaters. You don't have to be of great means to enjoy opera today.) After the interview I went to NPR's webpage to hear a sample recording and I was amazed by it. So for a few bucks I bought the CD. The CD, by the way, is necessary because it comes with a fantastic booklet, something I didn't even know when I bought it.

The music is eerily beautiful. I lack the technical vocabulary to describe it, but it contains some of the best opera pieces I've heard. The booklet gets the mind thinking. How misogyny can be dangerous to men. How art, sex, religion and power stream together. How those in power with unconventional tastes in sex can actually dictate its expression at a horrid expense; that is, at the expense of children. And, of course, how poverty forces the hand of parents. (Is a parent whose children are worked to death horrible because he hopes his castrated son might make enough money to free the entire family from such a fate?)

In thinking about the success of movies like "Amadeus" you can't help but think somebody is missing a fantastic opportunity to write this story. Somehow it would have to bend beyond the straight horror of it, making as hollywood often does, the poverty class as the doers of evil because they are too stupid and morally baron to know better. This is a story about how the powerful, including and perhaps especially the church used economic desperation as a means for their own sexual gratification as expressed through music. This album could serve as inspiration.

Cecilia Bartoli is not only perhaps the loveliest voice I have ever heard, but she also does a service to opera. She delves into songbooks that would otherwise not be recorded or perhaps even be lost. From Salieri, to Opera Proibita to Maria. . . . and now Sacrificium. The songbook of The Castrata!! It is important to preserve such opera history and I applaud her delving into this less safe music (commercially). Hopefully we are unlikely to ever hear a modern recording of a true castrata singing this songbook, so a brilliant mezzo is the obvious choice to preserve this music. The accompanying book is absolutely fascinating by the way.

Bravo Cecilia, both I and posterity thank you!!

I went to listen to Cecilia Bartoli perform this music at the Brussels Bozar Cernter for Fine Arts. One of the most powerful voices on the planet. This project is about XVIII century music written for "castrati", young males who were castrated before puberty to keep their voices from maturing into full male voices.

A stunning performance, she can not just sing but enthrall the crowd to with her flamboyant personality. She was clearly having fun! I was lucky enough to find a ticket close enough to her to feel my bones vibrate at her seemingly endless warble. Her technical virtuosity is almost painful to hear, one keeps wondering how she can keep going so long, so powerfully and so well without breathing. The concert hall was shaking. She sounds supernatural. Maybe she is.

The CD fully reflects her talent, and the accompanying materials, and pamphlet, are worth the cost of the luxury edition. Not to be missed.