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Bel canto
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- This article is concerned with a particular style of singing. For the Norwegian synth trio Bel Canto, see Bel Canto (band).
Bel canto (
Belcanto, bel canto) (Italian,
beautiful singing), an
Italian musical term, refers to the art and science of vocal technique which originated in
Italy during the late sixteenth century and reached its pinnacle in the early part of the nineteenth century during the Bel Canto
opera era.
Rossini,
Bellini, and
Donizetti best exemplify this style, which flourished from approximately 1810 to 1830. Some would credit the 17th century composer
Pietro Cavalli with introducing bel canto, but his smooth and flowing melodic lines have a different style which belongs to a different era.
Bel canto singing characteristically focuses on perfect evenness throughout the voice, skillful legato, a light upper register, tremendous agility and flexibility, and a certain lyric, "sweet" timbre. Operas of the style featured extensive and florid ornamentation, requiring much in the way of fast scales and cadenzas. Bel canto emphasizes technique rather than volume: exercise said to demonstrate its epitome involves a singer holding a lit candle to her mouth and singing without causing the flame to flicker.
Aside from the bel canto era and the belcanto style of opera, singers can use a bel canto method of singing even in verismo, Wagnerian, Verdian, and modern styles. Singers with powerful voices who have used the bel canto technique include Eva Turner, Elena Nicolai, Todor Mazarof (Masaroff), Ghena Dimitrova and Maria Caniglia.
While historians typically date the bel canto period to the early 19th century, the term itself did not come into common usage in its current sense until the middle of the 19th century. At that time composers such as
Wagner began to call for larger, more dramatic voices; opponents of this trend complained, with
Rossini, "Alas for us, we have lost our bel canto."
The sopranos Maria Callas and Joan Sutherland probably provided the best-known examples of bel canto singers in the post-war period. (Virginia Zeani and Leyla Gencer, both bel canto sopranos of equal abilities, made fewer recordings and thus their fame suffered in America.) In more recent years, June Anderson made quite a success in Europe and the United States, focusing almost exclusively on soprano roles in the bel canto repertoire. For many years, few tenors sang bel canto; however, since the appearance of Chris Merritt and Rockwell Blake they have started to reappear. Some commentators regard Raul Gimenez, Juan Diego Flórez and William Matteuzzi as skilled contemporary bel canto tenors; other commentator however demur, given the clear and distinct differentiation between the bel canto technique and the bel canto repertoire (the latter of which said tenors sing often and successfully).[1]
Notes
- ^
See Ciampa, The Twilight of Belcanto, Prologo.
References
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