In 1649 in Discorsi e regole sopra la musica et il contrappunto 1Severo Bonini talks about 5 aspects that the singer has to respect in order to transmit the passions and move the listener: Armonia, Metro, Narrazione Soggetto and Grazia.

S (Severo): Sappiate dunque che la Musica ha possanza d'indur l'uomo in diverse passioni con l'armonia che nasce da suoni e da voci, col numero determinato che contiene nel verso detto metro, con la narrazzione d'alcuno costume come istoria o favola, col suggetto ben disposto et atto a ricever le passioni. Aggiungo la quinta che è la grazzia, con la quale il cantor deve con bella maniera porger le dette quattro cose, acciò cagioni l'effetto al quale sarà detta musica indirizzata.

S (Severo): Know that Music has the power of inducing human being into various passions with harmony that is born from sounds and voices, the determinate number contained in the verse, called metro, the narration of the fact, story or fairy, the sympathetic subject open to receive passions. I add the 5ht one that is grace, with which the singer has to put together and deliver with elegance the previous four things so that this will cause the effect which this music is addressed to.

Thanks to Giovan Battista Bovicelli (Regole, passaggi di musica, madrigali e mottetti passeggiati 1594), Francesco Rognoni (Selva dei vari passaggi 1620) and Pier Francesco Tosi (Opinioni de' cantori antichi e moderni 1723) we have specific examples in notation accompanied by proper vocal instructions, that I summed up and simplified as follows:

 AVERTIMENTI PER LI PASSAGGI (advice about passaggi=way to go from one note to another)


AVERTIMENTI QUANTO ALLE PAROLE (advice about words):

The singer always has to keep an eye on the entire phrase but saying the right words in the right way, because a lazy pronunciation takes away the affection of the phrase. The singer, particularly in the passaggi, doesn't have to think only about notes but also at words, and understand them. Of primary importance is then the separation of notes in order to give an accent (rompere le note per accentuare) and not in order of brutally changing the syllable length. When passaggi have notes of the same lenght, ones should not repeat a new syllable but easily continue to develop till the end the -sound of the- first syllable:

The term sprezzatura does not have a musical origin but it first appeared in the Cortegiano (The courtier) of Baldassarre Castiglione (Urbino 1528), a refined portrait of the perfect court man behaviour:

«Trovo una regula universalissima, la qual mi par valer circa questo in tutte le cose umane che si facciano o dicano più che alcun altra: e cioè fuggir quanto più si po, e come un asperissimo e pericoloso scoglio, la affettazione; e, per dir forse una nova parola, usar in ogni cosa una certa sprezzatura, che nasconda l’arte e dimostri ciò, che si fa e dice, venir fatto senza fatica e quasi senza pensarvi […] Da questo credo io che derivi assai la grazia: perché delle cose rare e ben fatte ognun sa la difficultà, onde in esse la facilità genera grandissima maraviglia; e per lo contrario il sforzare [...] dà somma disgrazia [...]e fa l’omo poco estimato»

«I find a very universal rule, which I think regards more this argument about all the human spoken or unspoken actions than anything else: escape as far as possible the sharp and dangerous reef called affectation (affettazione); and, perhaps using a new word, using in everything a certain sprezzatura (ease/aplomb/nonchalance), that can hide the art and demonstrate, what is said and what is done, without effort, almost without thinking about it […] I believe this is the result of grace (graciousness): because everybody knows the difficulty of rare and rightly-done things, where the ease creates marvel; on the contrary the effort […] provoke disgrace and makes the man unappreciated.»3

Later in this chapter, and more specifically in the video of chapter four, it will be observed through practical examples, how the seconda prattica is realized in musical writing.

But is seconda prattica to be intended exclusively as musical writing, as style of composition or also as interpretive style for the singer to adopt in performance? Perhaps this could sound obvious to ears which are experts of Monteverdi's music, but as singers, we face all the time technical singing challenges regarding the pronunciation of the text. For instance, there are ways of saying the text that a singer cannot do in the same way as an actor because consonants lock the flow of the sound (which happens in the “head”), something that doesn't happen when we are in our spoken register (chest), so we cannot put “pressure” on the lips but we have to separate the “articulation place” -lips, teeth, tongue, frontal jaw-from the “resonating space” -maschera (the space behind the eyes), soft palate, back of the head-. In the light of this “separation”, we learn how to “drop the consonants” to avoid the air pressure on them and a consequent leak of air, which would cause a loss of support in the voice, and again consequent tightening of the larynx, maybe also a difficulty in reaching the end of the musical sentence, because out of breath. To be clear, this doesn't mean that we have to step far from the text, that in any case has to be clear and understandable, but rather the opposite: the technical expedients allow us to have a shiny sound rich of colors and defined, well-pronounced words, where the first fully express the meaning of the seconds, enhancing the word-sound relationship.

It follows that expressing the deep connection between music and text is for singers the key to a direct and honest transmission of emotions. How is this possible during a practical approach to singing? In all the early music treatises I found, there is a common denominator called Grazia (grace).

Looking at the text it is possible to notice 9 sections, interspersed by the choir of fishermen (sections 1-4) and by Dorilla (sections 5-8) ending with the 1^st fisherman (9).

The text itself gives already many pieces of information to the performer. She should understand not only the general meaning of the text but focus on what those words mean for Arianna in that precise moment, which is her mindset inside the section and how this mindset changes with new words, when Arianna's words are depending from her feelings and which from her rational thoughts.

Each section shows a different energy and a different mindset of Arianna. Here a resume of all the sections with their incipits and ends:

1. 1. Lasciatemi morire... / ...lasciatemi morire.

      Leave me to die.../...leave me to die.

   2. O Teseo, o Teseo mio.../...ed io più non vedrovvi, o madre, o padre mio.

      O Theseus, o my Theseus.../...while I will never again see you, o Mother, o Father of mine.

   3. Dove, dove è la fede che tanto mi giuravi?.../...la misera Arianna che a te fidossi e ti diè gloria e vita?

      Where, where is the faith, that you swore so often to me?.../...the pitiable Ariadne who trusted you and gave you glory and life?

   4. Ahi, che non pur risponde!.../...Parlò la lingua sì, ma non già il core.

      Alas, he doesn't even respond!.../...My tongue spoke, yes, but not my heart.

   5. Misera! Ancor dò loco a la tradita speme.../...Così va chi tropp'ama e troppo crede.

      Poor me, do I still hold onto a betrayed hope.../...Such is one's lot if one loves and trusts too much.

   6. Nacqui regina.../...Tempo è ch'io mora; al mio voler t'acqueta.

      I was born as Queen.../...Now it's time for me to die; assent to my wish.

   7. Vivo, moro o vaneggio?.../...che far debb'io, che creder deggio?

      Am I living, dying, or dreaming?.../...What should I do? What should I believe?

   8. Ma che sian di Teseo chi m'assicura?.../...Non cercar Arianna altra ventura.

      But who assures me that they be Theseus'?.../...Arianna, do not seek a different future.

   9. Io son, io son contenta.../...Non sì lieve i pensier cangiano i Regi.

      I am, I am content.../...Not so easily do Kings change their minds.

The printed edition as we know it, ends with the fifth section, and the Lamento is usually performed till there (“chi tropp'ama e troppo crede”). But my choice as a singer was to study the whole music piece since the rest of the opera went lost, it would be a shame not to know the rest of the music that Monteverdi wrote, even if officially the lamento ends in bar 94. Right after that in fact, the dialogue with Dorilla begins and the sections of Arianna become shorter, precisely because this is a back-and-forth between the two characters and not a solo aria anymore.

Hereby I share my research work regarding the "twists" of Arianna, explaining what defines the “mood” of every section, which I named with feelings (sad/angry, etc..), and specifying to whom she is talking, to help myself to go more in the character during the study process. I approached the text first as an actor, and then as a singer; the idea is to first offer a passionate portrait of Arianna to have a clear vision of the emotions contained in the text before singing the music, which will enhance or sweeten the expressive outcomes of the text analysis.4 The second part of every section will regard in fact how Monteverdi expressed the text in music, analyzing some examples.

2. In love sad-desperate in pain – she talks to: Teseo

O Teseo, o Teseo mio.../...ed io più non vedrovvi, o madre, o padre mio. = O Theseus, o my Theseus.../...while I will never again see you, o Mother, o Father of mine.

The second part begins with the invocation of Teseo, whose name appears many times in the piece, six times only in this section. Every time the name of her beloved one appears in the text, his image pops up in Arianna's mind, and she realizes that despite all he did to her, she still loves him (in the first two lines she calls him “mine” twice), like a powerful drug which she cannot but think about. These moments that are expressed in music by a sort of leitmotif that comes with Teseo's name, are always accompanied by long notes and a major chord on “Teseo mio”, suggesting the love that Arianna still feels for him.

Here Arianna is directly talking to him, she begs him to come back to her (Volgiti Teseo mio) and she tries to remind him all the good things she did for him (colei che ha lasciato per te la patria e il regno, she left her home and her family to stay by his side). She calls her own name always accompanied by adjectives as poor, miserable (except in the 8^th section where she invites herself to surrender at the idea of a different future “non cercar Arianna altra ventura”). At the end of this second part, we can feel Arianna's desperation when she realized that Teseo is going home, unlikely she will never see her parents again. Monteverdi enhance this contrast in an ABAB structure, where A is a happy, dancing (hemiola) music that emulates the joy of Teseo going home and B is the sadness of Arianna alone on the island, far from her family (A: a te prepara Atene liete pompe superbe/ B: ed io rimango cibo di fere in solitarie arene; A: te l'uno e l'altro tuo vecchio parente stringeran lieti/ B: ed io più non vedrovvi o madre o padre mio). The D major chord represents the love of Arianna for Teseo and it is always followed by a “twist” in which Arianna quickly passes from “sweetly in love” to “angry/desperate”. These moments are always characterized by sour words, underlined by Monteverdi through strong dissonances (dispietate=pitiless, fere=beasts). Dissonances also have the goal of showing the sharp pain of Arianna. This happens for instance when she realizes that she will never see her parents anymore (O Madre, O Padre mio).

3. Unbelieving/beginning of consciousness – she talks to: Teseo.

Dove, dove è la fede che tanto mi giuravi?.../...la misera Arianna che a te fidossi e ti diè gloria e vita? = Where, where is the faith, that you swore so often to me?.../...the pitiable Ariadne who trusted you and gave you glory and life?

This section is a series of questions that Arianna asks Teseo, powerfully enhanced but the musical pauses that Monteverdi writes in between as if Arianna is looking in the silence for the answers that will never come to her. This tight sequence of detailed questions indicates perhaps that, even if she doesn't want to believe it, Arianna starts to realize that Teseo is unfaithful and that his promises were vain. The most precious dissonance of the whole piece is in bar 69, where she says “ch'a te fidossi” = “Arianna trusted you”, and Monteverdi writes a dissonance F/F# in correspondence with the word “trusted”, symbolizing the pain that that memory (when she trusted him and she was happy because she felt like she could) brings back to her. A good performer will prolong that F natural a bit longer to get deeper into the dissonance.

In summary, in all the treaties the singer is always encouraged to sing with grace, meaning to pay attention to the words, the accents of the notes and their correspondence with syllables, having always a look to the musical sentence in its length, and with a clear articulation of the notes especially during the passaggi.

In the light of what has been described in the previous pages, singers have today the difficult and at the same time, fascinating task of interpreting the music of 16th and 17th-century, being aware of the treatises indications and I would say at the same time of all that came after, who saw a massive development of bel canto5 in all its variety (opera, lieder, sacred music).

Monteverdi and his contemporaries, more than any other composers in the history of music are unknowingly the protagonists of the most diverse undertook ground-breaking experiments and innovations. This awareness opens many windows to new elements of discussion: what are the possible interpretation keys of this music? Are there wrong and right interpretation keys? Is there a right way of performing this music and is it correct to adapt the interpretation to nowadays? How much is important to remember (or forget) the vocal legacy of the Italian 18^th-century opera? Which role plays vibrato and how meaningful is it in this interpretative context? How can a singer create with the voice different colors and dynamics starting from the meaning of the text and respecting the style?

This elaborate does not have the goal, much less the presumption of answering to these questions, but it wants to use these questions to help to reflect on what vocal interpretation means.

The Lamento d'Arianna sums up all the characteristics of the music of Monteverdi and represents for me an incredible vocal “gym” to develop my interpretation skills. For this reason, I have decided to study it, sing it and analyze it, going every time deeper into the text meaning and trying to find the right colors for each word/feeling. I recorded myself in different moments of my study process, and I collected and listened to other versions of the Lamento sung by singers from different musical backgrounds.

Before going to analyse these different interpretations, it is necessary to introduce the history of the Lamento d'Arianna and his sources, and explaining why this piece is so important for the history of vocal music.

4. Anger repentance – she talks to: nature forces, Teseo.

Ahi, che non pur risponde!.../...Parlò la lingua sì, ma non già il core.

Alas, he doesn't even respond!.../...My tongue spoke, yes, but not my heart.

As soon as Arianna realizes that there is no response, she explodes in a spiral of anger and almost with a power of a witch, she invokes the winds and sea waves, ordering them to drag Teseo away (O storm-clouds, o tornados, o winds, submerge him under the waves! Hurry, orcs and whales, and with his filthy limbs feel the deep abysses!). The music here gets agitated, the rhythm is tight and notes are very quick, so the singer has a real tongue twist to perform...with sprezzatura. It is the only moment in the whole lament in which Arianna goes out of her weakness and shows that she still has the power to react. But she immediately regrets it and she assures to Teseo that those words were not coming from her heart, but from her anguished “tongue” as proof of her divided self. The stile recitativo here (bar 81-87) is even more faithful to the rhythm of the spoken words, which as a native Italian speaker I might say is perfectly respected (from non son quell'io till parlò la lingua sì ma non già il core).

5. Self-pity/commiseration acceptation – she talks to: herself, to death, to her beloved ones (family, friends, and servants)

Misera! Ancor dò loco a la tradita speme.../...Così va chi tropp'ama e troppo crede. = Poor me, do I still hold onto a betrayed hope.../...Such is one's lot if one loves and trusts too much.

In the fifth section, Arianna feels pity for herself because, despite so much scorn, she still loves Teseo, and only death can extinguish the flames of love. In a sort of last goodbye speech, she speaks to her parents, her friends, her servants, telling them that “this (death) is the end of she who loves and trusts too much”. Here Dorilla talks for the first time, reminding Arianna that she is a queen, and death is not a worthy thought for a royal lady. Arianna replies opening to what it has been called addendum, which is the dialogue with Dorilla.

Looking at the addendum the most interesting aspect, from a performing point of view, is that if in the lamento, Arianna was complaining all the time about her misfortune, being a victim of her pain, here she faces it with dignity (she reminds herself that she is a queen “Nacqui regina”), and she starts using her rationality, accepting that Teseo might not come back and that the wisest thing to do is to stop hoping, because kings do not change their mind easily (“non sì lieve i pensier cangian i regi”). This means that the dialogue with Dorilla makes Arianna react and think about what happened to her (we often see things clearly when we start talking about it with someone else). With the only text fragments of Arianna it would have been impossible to fully understand what is happening. I truly believe that during a performance it would be really powerful to have an actress playing Dorilla (since we don't have the music) with whom Arianna can react. The expressions will be a consequence of a fresh reaction and singing would benefit from this interaction. It is my wish to experiment with this dialogue during my final master concert at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague (June 2020).

6. Happy memory/acceptation/order as a queen- she talks to: Dorilla.

Nacqui regina.../...Tempo è ch'io mora; al mio voler t'acqueta.= I was born Queen.../...Now it's time for me to die; assent to my wish.

Arianna tells Dorilla that she has been a queen with a good life, as long as it pleased Heaven, but now she wants to die. As a queen, she gives her last order to Dorilla (“assent to my wish”=to die), but right at this moment Dorilla announces that Teseo is coming back, she saw his ships at the shore.

Starting from the fact that all the singers mentioned above are more developed than me and despite some technical issues which as a student I am still trying to fix, I tried to perform a version of the lamento as much as faithful to the tempo, and with a variety of colors and intentions that allowed me to have a large spectrum of emotions. Being honest, even my version doesn't convince me. This recording is from October 2019 and listening back at it there are many things that I would do differently. For example, I would have like to control more the vibrato especially on the last notes of every phrase which are always too loud. Some “O” sounds too open, almost as “A”. I am happy instead about the energy level which I believe mirrors the emotional state of Arianna and the variety of dynamics, and I am happy about the choice of using the only theorbo to accompany the voice. This is exactly the purpose of this research which wants to investigate the vocal process starting from the study of the given material (sources, treaties) and not giving an example of perfection which I am pretty far from and not interested about.

The first and most obvious thing that pops up listening to all these recordings, is that they seem to belong to different composers, sometimes they even seem different pieces, such is the freedom that all of them -some more than others- have taken from the sources. But this lack of fidelity in no way detracts from the elegance and power of the execution, that simply becomes something else, far from what Monteverdi and Rinuccini wrote. The most interesting thing is that I haven't been able to find a recording of the Lamento that is completely faithful to the sources.

Why is it so difficult to sing this music a tempo, paying attention to the words (it needs to be reminded that the first Arianna was an actress)? I think there are two main reasons. The first one is very simple: this music is difficult. Performing is like freezing the shape of the music text and here the musical writing is so honest and naked that any personal initiative of the performer has the effect of putting makeup on the perfect clean face of a child. This doesn't mean that singing Bach is easy, but for example, the music of Bach has always a very clear structure, especially regarding harmony, that here is depending from the words “on the spot”. But this is what is interesting and special about a music piece like the lamento: the performer has to blow life into it. The second reason regards the fact that nowadays Monteverdi is performed in big theaters, and to pass the orchestra the voice needs a more “bel canto setting”, to get more focused on the power of the sound.

I believe the lamento should be sung as an aria but performed as an actress delivering the text, and these two sides should be inseparable in the performance. But sometimes singers have to find compromises, especially when our wishes go against the ones of the conductor/directior...

For instance, I studied the lamento being very faithful to the tactus and the text pronunciation, but when I found myself singing the lamento on the bottom of stage and very far from the audience, because of a choice of the stage director, I had to adopt a different vocal approach to reach the ears of the audience. This meant that the attention to obtain power in the sound, meaning the focus on singing technique, compromised in part my attention to the text delivery and distracted me a bit from the text meaning. The tempo happened to be dilatated, and I saw myself stepping far from that previous approach that was allowing me to speak the text as an actress.

What is important I believe is being honest, being true to the music and ourselves. To do this, it is vital to learn to separate our own vocal and expressive comforts from the composer's wishes. Trusting the musical instinct doesn't mean to fall in doing what it's easier or automatic for us. My automatic mistake for example, which I have been working on the most, was (unconsciously) putting my feelings in front of Arianna's. For instance, I noticed that sometimes while I sing the lamento I get emotional because of my compassion for Arianna, and her love that is still there despite being abandoned often brought me nearly to tears, making singing complicated. This means that when this happens, I am still “Elisa” and not “Arianna”, and this mistake takes away the emotions of the character, which should be the main focus. Our feelings as performers are not important compared to the ones of the character that we play, or better, they are when they do not twist the innate feelings of the music/character.

There is much more freedom in following “the rules” of the music than in improvising a version that gets far from those: already trying to do what is written, opens to infinite possibilities in colors, dynamics, and accentuation possibilities; it is matter to be wise enough to choose those who will lead to a direct transmission of emotions. If the singer understands well the meaning of the text, the message of the music and the relationship between the two, without any spare wish of showing off her virtuosity, there is no chance that the performance will be tacky. About vibrato, I believe on the base of personal experimentation, teaching and the reading of vocal anatomy treaties (Juvarra, Fussi) and talking to other singers and phoniatricians that the vibrato when is natural shouldn't be discriminated by any music, as long as the singer can control it and decide when to use it or not, especially in order to respect the text.

Why then don't try to apply the cantare con grazia to all the music we sing?

7. Panic – she talks to: Dorilla.

Vivo, moro o vaneggio?.../...che far debb'io, che creder deggio?

Am I living, dying, or dreaming?.../...What should I do? What should I believe?

The poor Arianna doesn't know what to believe anymore, doubting even about her mental state (the Eb chord suddenly pops up from another harmony to express her emotional shock), that's why Dorilla tries to focus her attention on the view of the ships and the sound of the trumpets that announce Teseo's return, which is real (“Look there where the sound comes from, don't you see yet the port already full of a thousand masts?”).

8. Incredulous/faithless/tired - she talks to: Dorilla, herself.

Ma che sian di Teseo chi m'assicura?.../...Non cercar Arianna altra ventura. =But who assures me that they be Theseus'?.../...Arianna, do not seek a different future.

After all the pain she suffered she doesn't want to believe anymore it's Teseo coming back. She abandons her hopes and she calls her name again, encouraging herself to “do not seek a different future”. Dorilla invites her then to go personally to the shore to see Teseo with her own eyes. “Speranza iniqua”(iniquitous hope) appears exactly in the middle of the section; before that the melody is ascending, after that is descending, meaning that the awareness of a fake hope changed her mental/body energy.

9. Acceptation/hopeless – she talks to: Dorilla.

Arianna replies that Dorilla can lead her to the way, but there is no way Arianna will ever hope that Teseo came back to be reunited to her, because “Not so easily do Kings change their minds”. Arianna's words “Ma che mi lassi e spregi, or torni e mi raccolga è folle speme” (But that who leaves and scorns me now return and take me, is a mad hope), are announced regularly by the bass which moves on heavy half notes, violently interrupts the singing dividing it in short fragments.

Later, a fisherman anticipates that very soon Arianna will discover the truth and he feels in his heart that Arianna will find happiness again.

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In his treatise Musical Practice (Venice 1592) Lodovico Zacconi writes:

In tutte le operazioni humane […] si ricerca gratia e attidudine; non dico gratia per intendere di quella gratia ch'hanno i sudditi particulari sotto i re e gli imperatori, ma ben per quella ch'hanno gli huomini quando in fare un attione dimostrano di farla senza fatica; e all'agilità, aggiungano le vaghezze e'l garbo.

In all human actions [...] one looks for grace and a good attitude, I don't mean grace as that grace who servants show in front of kings and emperors, but that grace that humans have when they act without showing any effort; and to agility, they add beauty and courtesy.

In the new edition of the Nuove musiche (1614), Caccini talks again about sprezzatura, this time in a even more specific way to singing:

«La sprezzatura è quella leggiadria la quale si dà al canto c'ol trascorso di più crome, e semicrome sopra diverse corde col qual fatto à tempo, togliendosi al canto una certa terminata angustia, e secchezza, si rende piacevole, licenzioso, e arioso, si come nel parlar comune la eloquenza, e la fecondia rende agevoli, e dolci le cose di cui si favella»

«Sprezzatura is that gracefulness given to singing led through more eight and sixteenth notes on various tones, a tempo; taking away from the singing a certain narrowness and dryness, one makes pleasant, free and airy, just as in the eloquence of a common speech, and this flowering makes easy and sweet the things being spoken of.»

(n.b, as once a very good singing teacher told me: if you have not done the first steps, graceful recitation and sprezzatura, ornaments will not help you).

Lamento d'Arianna

The opera Arianna performed for the first time in 1608, was commissioned by the Duke of Mantova Vincenzo Gonzaga -on the occasion of the marriage between his son Francesco Gonzaga with Princess Margaret of Savoy- to Ottavio Rinuccini who had been asked to write a text for Claudio Monteverdi to set to music. Monteverdi came to Mantova on October 10^th, 1607, to begin his collaboration with Rinuccini, and the soprano Caterina Martinelli, who was supposed to sing Arianna, died in March 1608. The new Arianna happened to be an actress already in Mantova at that time, her name was Virginia Ramponi Andreini that performed on May 28, 1608, in front of a huge audience (6000) that we know being moved to the point of tears during the lamento6.

All we have today is the Lamento, the rest of the opera went lost. Luckily the Lamento was the heart of the whole opera and Monteverdi himself describes it in one of his letters as “the most essential part of the opera”7, and the only published one.

A polyphonic version of the Lament has been published in Il sesto libro de madrigali (Ricciardo Amadino, Venice, 1614) while there are two editions for soprano and basso continuo published in 1623, simultaneously in Venice by Gardano (with the title Lamento d'Arianna, now conserved in the library of Ghent) and in Orvieto by Michelangelo Fei e Rinaldo Ruuli (inside the collection Il maggio fiorito edited by Giovan Battista Rocchigiani and now conserved in the library of Bologna), both are printed versions. Various manuscript copies exist, one of them is in Florence in the Magliabechiano manuscript8, kept at the central national library, which includes the dialogue with Dorilla (addendum); another one is in London and is attributed to Luigi Rossi, which also includes the addendum. Later in 1641, Monteverdi will publish a monodic contra factum with a Latin text entitled Pianto della Madonna sopra il lamento d'Arianna (“Iam moriar, fili mi”).

The importance of Arianna as a human emotion portrait

Rinuccini gave already all the tools to visualize in a clear way the emotional spectrum of Arianna, and Monteverdi deeply expressed through stile recitativo all the colors of this spectrum putting them into music. This research does not investigate the rhetoric aspects of the Lamento d'Arianna but I believe this music piece is the most brilliant example of seconda prattica that one can find. The writing for only voice and continuo is naked and direct, without any shadow of fear or unclarity. The language of the music is clean and honest. Music never betrays the text, every note, every musical sentence is in the function of expressing the meaning of the text in the most direct way possible, without thinking even for a moment to the “sound effect”. The attention of the composer is totally focused “on the spot”, on what is happening to Arianna in that specific moment and every note and rhythmical choices are consequences of what Arianna feels in that exact moment. Not to mention the importance that silences have in the piece, which needs to be “sung” as well. This is the reason why respecting the tempo is so important. Every note and every pause are there for a reason, and this reason is the text meaning, that finds through music the direct expression of the emotions. If the performer takes too much freedom, she simply changes the meaning of what is written.

The strength and originality of this musical piece are to be found in the wish of Monteverdi to portray the emotion of only human characters: “The Arianna brings me to a just lament; and the Orfeo to a just prayer...Ariadne was moving for being a woman, and similarly, Orpheus was moving for being a man, and not a wind”.9

The entire drama is built around one central character, and Arianna speaks to us in such a direct way because Monteverdi makes her share with us through music, her humanity, which makes us close to her.

In light of what described above, it is now possible to actively listen to different recordings of the Lamento (I have to say I am a great fan of all of these singers), as anticipated in the paragraph “The current problem of interpretation”.

1. Monteverdi, seconda prattica and the doctrine of affections (teoria degli affetti)

The doctrine of the affections, (Affektenlehre) was a theory in the aesthetics of painting, music, and theatre, widely used in the Baroque era (1600–1750) based on the idea that the passions could be represented by their outward visible or audible signs.

Between '500 and '600 the theory of music identified every affect in a different emotional states (joy, pain, fear, desire...) that were identified again by specific musical figures, rhetorical figures.

Rhetoric is the art of persuasive communication or as Aristotele writes “the faculty of discovering all the available means of persuasion in any given situation”.

«La retorica [...] ora allieta l'animo, ora lo rattrista, poi lo incita all'ira, poi alla commiserazione, all'indignazione, alla vendetta, alle passioni violente e ad altri effetti; e ottenuto il turbamento emotivo, porta infine l'uditore destinato ad essere persuaso a ciò cui tende l'oratore. Allo stesso modo la musica, combinando variamente i periodi e i suoni, commuove l'animo con vario esito.»10 

«Rhetoric relieves the soul, now it makes her sad, then it leads her to anger, then commiseration, indignation, revenge, violent passions, and other effects; and after having obtained the emotional perturbation, it leads the listener to feel what the speaker communicates. In the same way, music, combining in various ways periods and sounds, touches the soul with various results.» 11

In the preface of his 5th Book of Madrigals (1605) Monteverdi announced his own Seconda pratica, overo perfettione della moderna musica. Monteverdi with his seconda prattica says that to communicate to the audience the human passions (teoria degli affetti), music has to be servant of text.

More specifically, the term seconda prattica, sometimes referring to the Stile Moderno, appeared for the first time in 1603 in Giovanni Artusi's book Seconda Parte dell'Artusi, overo Delle imperfettioni della moderna musica (The Second Part of The Artusi, or Imperfections of Modern Music). In the first part of The Artusi (1600), Artusi had criticized several madrigals of Claudio Monteverdi, while in the second part, L'Ottuso Accademico (the academic obtuse), whose identity is unknown, takes the side of Monteverdi and others "who have embraced this new second practice". Monteverdi adopted the term to distinguish his music from that music composed by the musicians of the prima prattica, such Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina and Gioseffo Zarlino, and to portray a new music which wanted to inspire more freedom from the harmonic and contrapuntal limitations of the prima prattica.

The expression Stile moderno was coined by Giulio Caccini in Le nuove musiche (1601), a book of monodies characterized by purity in the basso continuo who had the function of accompanying the lyrics in a style that encourage ornamentations which are explained in the score.

Lamento d'Arianna - Examples

Dame Roberta Mameli

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKs_jIGJugE

Singing here is very elegant and delicate, maybe a too sweet sadness is evoked compared to Arianna's sharp and contradictory feelings. On the other side, the continuo and the singing are together in every breath.

Dame Monserrat Figueras

https://open.spotify.com/track/1WmMfgI9rtZwTbha37jQ86?si=1v8Pi4mNS12kmor4PNxp_Q

It is beautifully sung and Monserrat Figueras knows what sprezzatura is, but Arianna is not an angel, is a woman! And in some points, for example during the concitato at minute 7.24' (when Arianna calls the forces of nature to take Teseo away), I believe the singing missed to show some anger, and why not some “ugliness”.

Dame Anna Caterina Antonacci

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LARI9cIub1k (0.58') She is acting on stage and this obviously makes a difference with a recording done in studio. I find this performance very powerful but often the singer doesn't respect the note values, and her vocal style appeals to ears more used to listen to 19^th-century opera.

Dame Romina Basso

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tiSziMlnlwo (begins 2.43') I love this recording because I find it has nice energy, also in the continuo, which is strengthened by the beautiful dark color of her voice. The performance is alive and full of beauty, but also here the tactus isn't always respected.

Dame Anne Sophie von Otter

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9L0agRpBmZ8 I always admired the eclecticism of this singer in terms of music styles, but in this case, the choice of a very slow tempo, dilatated the words, and the power of the text with his accentuation, went a bit lost.

Dame Renata Tebaldi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kcaFlluZEA Dame Renata Tebaldi shows us here accompanied by the piano, how to “re-compose” Monteverdi's Lamento, which stops to be Monteverdi. I found this recording very interesting because even if everything is different (harmony, tempo, notes in the melody), it made me realize that when one has the strength, the personality, the determination, and the voice to present something different convincingly, she can sell everything to the audience.

Me 

https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/807464/807672/1/11507 (only audio)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSq1qskMJb8 (Video, sections 1and 5)

The situation is different for the text by Rinuccini which we have in its entirety and that knows four editions in 1608, two in Mantova, one in Florence and one in Venice.12

This text follows the libretto of the whole opera as found in Solerti (vol. II)13. Literal translation by Barbara Sach.14

AVERTIMENTI INTORNO ALLE NOTE (advice about notes)

Concerning notes (such as passaggi, gruppetti and salti) it's wise to passeggiare accentuating the important notes: this requires a good ear and ability to listen to the other parts because often voices (except in the end) reach the new harmony in different moments as it happens in the example:


C. sol fa ut in G. sol re ut, et C. sol fa. nel primo; da D. la sol re in A. la mi re, et in D. la sol, come nel secondo. 

1. Sad-angry/in shock – she talks to: the fishermen

Lasciatemi morire... / ...lasciatemi morire = Leave me to die.../...leave me to die.

If one tries to go deep in the text meaning, it can be noticed that since the beginning Arianna is not just sad, but she is angry and shocked and she cannot believe to what happened to her “And what do you think can comfort me in so harsh a destiny?” but the word “volete” makes the meaning stronger as if she is saying “what do you want from me? Let me die in peace!”. “Lasciatemi morire” appears four times in the first section, two times before and two times after the question mentioned above, so the performer knows that he cannot say that phrase four times always in the same sad way, but it needs to be colored differently. I opted for an angry beginning and a sad/hopeless end of the first section, basing my choice on the correspondence with the notation. Besides, it is possible that here Arianna is talking to the fishermen (Lasciatemi= you 2^nd person plural), since in the text right before the lament (Solerti) the choir of fishermen says that they live on that “solitary sands” and they see Arianna coming towards them. It is impossible to know that Arianna is not alone without reading the libretto, the score doesn't have this information.

two different phases of my study process

lamento

https://www.npostart.nl/podium-witteman/20-10-2019/VPWON_1304755

lamento

from Bovicelli15

from Bovicelli16

Ahi che non pur rispondi (38'22")

O Teseo, O Teseo mio, non son, non son quell'io! (39'51")

Elisa De Toffol & Giorgia Zanin, 20/10/201917

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These exaples by Rognoni show how to "portare la voce" con grazia (move the voice with elegance)20