thomas mark montgomery <thomas8@t...> wrote:
thomas mark montgomery <thomas8@t...> wrote:
>
> I haven't done any reading on this subject in years, but I
> distinctly remember that there were soprano castrati (both
> primo and secondo) and alto castrati.
Definitely. As I said later in the same message:
"whereas the alto section was a mix of intact adult male
altos, older castrati, and teenagers."
There were several celebrated alto castrati, like Senesino. Just like
with women's voices, though, most castrati were sopranos rather than
altos. Also, we're talking about choir sopranos and altos. Even an
alto castrato was likely to have a higher range than the intact
altos, probably perfectly able to cover soprano parts (most of the
rep's sop parts originally written for boys, who generally have a
shorter range than women sops) in choirs where alto sections already
had a motley of different types (mentioned above), with the alto
castrati not in the majority.
I'm sure there were some choirs where most of the soprano and alto
parts were "manned" by castrati, but probably the exception. But the
whole point was that this rep isn't really done much anymore, so it's
not worth the effort of talking about HIP practice for Italian
castrati era church choral music...
Tako
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