ARIADNE’S ECHO

Description

Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643)
Lasciatemi morire
from Lamento d’Arianna SV22, Venice 1623,
new arrangement by Alessandro Parisotti, Arie antiche, vol. II, Milan, Ricordi, 1890

Anonymous
Mezza tra viva e morta (Lamento d’Olimpia), cantata for soprano and basso continuo
Rome, Biblioteca Casanatense fondo Baini, Ms. 2505

Girolamo Frescobaldi (1567-1643)
Tocata per la levatione F 12.45
from“Messa della Madonna”, Fiori Musicali, Venice, 1635

Luigi Rossi (1597-1653)
Potesti i lini sciogliere, chamber cantata for soprano and basso continuo
Northwestern University Library, Evanston (IL), Ms. 1/14

Domenico Mazzocchi (1592-1665)
S’io mi parto o mio bel sole, ciaccona, for flute and basso continuo
Urbania, Biblioteca Comunale fondo Ubaldini, Ms. VI.2.17/22

Marco Marazzoli (1602-1662)
Abbattuto dal duolo, cantata for soprano and basso continuo
Naples, Biblioteca del Conservatorio “San Pietro a Majella”, Ms. 33.4.12(a)/13

Gaspar Sanz (1640-1710)
Marizápalos
from Cifras sobre la guitarra Española, book II, Zaragoza, 1675

Anonymous
O me infelice (Desperate Falsirena)
Library of Christ Church, Oxford, England, Mus. 959

Since the dawn of Western culture, women’s voices have been the object of suspicion and prejudice, often linked to an idea of danger, uncontrolled emotionality and imperfection. In the history of music, this phenomenon has been characterized in various ways. In seventeenth-century Italy, with the rise of musical genres such as opera and chamber cantata, in which individuality takes center stage, librettists, composers, and musicians experimented with the female voice across its emotional spectrum. With this selection of unpublished Roman cantatas from the mid-seventeenth century, Roberta Mameli and the Theatro dei Cervelli reveal a forgotten chapter in the history of female emotion whose expressive potential still resonates today with extraordinary relevance.