A Practical Method of Italian Singing
El Staplador (elstaplador)
Summary:
Scenes from the illustrious careers of Mlles Louise d'Armilly and Eugénie Danglars, set to music by Nicola Vaccaj.
Notes:
Nicola Vaccai wrote his 'Metodo Pratico de Canto Italiano de Camera' in 1832, setting words by the poet Pietro Metastasio. In this story, each section is headed by one of Vaccai's exercises. I've done my best to provide a rough translation within the narrative.
This is a Yuletide treat - hope you enjoy it! I am extremely fond of Eugénie and Louise.
Lesson I
The Scale
Manca sollecita
più dell'usato,
anchorche s'agiti
conlieve fiato,
face che palpita
presso al morir
1836
'What's this?' Eugénie asked. 'A new way of singing scales?'
'More or less,' Louise said. 'M. Neuchâtel sent it to me.' She showed Eugénie the cover.
'Metodo pratico di canto italiano per camera,' Eugénie read. “'A Practical Method of Italian Singing for the Chamber'.” She flicked through the book. 'It's rather below your level, surely?'
'Certainly. But if for any reason I'm unsuccessful on the stage, I could teach singing – as a profession, I mean, rather than simply for your amusement. It would come in useful as a textbook.'
'Indeed, if you are teaching rich young ladies with no aspirations towards serious singing.'
'It's rather below your level, too,' Louise said sweetly. 'If we'd had it when you first started learning to sing it would have been very useful, but you have long passed that stage. Still, it couldn't hurt to go through it – for after all, you are still a rich young lady.'
'Oh, Louise, if you knew how I long to -'
'To what?'
'To be like you. To live for nothing but my art, to leave this wearying round of men and money! Indeed, I had much rather teach rich young ladies than be one! At least I should then feel that I was contributing something to my muse.'
Louise smiled. 'Very few artists – Mozart excepted; one must always except Mozart – had contributed much by the age of fifteen.'
Eugénie was not to be placated. 'I see my life stretched out before me – an interminable scale, one dull note after another. First the suitors, then the marriage, then the children - and all punctuated by dull women discussing their dull lives!'
'One has to sing scales,' Louise said, feebly.
'Signor Vaccaj seems to think not,' Eugénie said, indicating the Practical Method. 'See this - why, it was years before you let me attempt an acciacatura! And here he introduces it in lesson eight.'
'Why, you said yourself - this method is not for those who wish to be serious singers, but only those who wish to make a charming noise in the drawing room.'
'That's true,' Eugénie said, mollified by the implication. She looked more closely at the first exercise. 'How would you translate this, do you think?'
'Italian is not my strong point, as well you know,' Louise said. 'I know enough for music, and my pronunciation is acceptable, but I am not sure that I could produce a respectable translation. However, since you insist, something like this: a candle flame, beginning to flicker even more than usual, is restored by the action of a light breath, though it was close to dying.'
'That's close,' Eugénie said. 'Close, but not exactly right. I think you have the opposite sense from what the poet intended. He is saying that a light breath makes the flame flicker. But then you are an optimist.'
'Am I?' Louise murmured. 'Am I indeed?'
'Say, for example,' Eugénie said, 'that the poet, Signor Metastasio, speaks not of a literal candle flame, but of the fire that burns within the heart...'
'What then?'
'Well, in my translation, a tiny setback, a doubt or a fear, is enough to extinguish that flame. In yours, the lover is not daunted by that doubt, but loves the more fervently. I believe -'
'Yes?'
'I believe,' Eugénie said, 'that I prefer yours.' And she bent and kissed Louise on the lips.
Intervals of Thirds
Semplicetta tortorella,
che non vede il suo periglio,
per fuggir da crudo artiglio
vola in grembo al cacciator.
1838
Eugénie lowered the blinds but, even though she could no longer see, she still could hear, and the sound of sniggering reached her.
'Oh, why is the world not a desert?' she exclaimed, throwing herself into Louise's arms.
As the barouche rolled away from the Bell and Bottle, Louise did her best to keep from laughing, but at length the desire overwhelmed her. Eugénie sprang away from her, hurt.
'Louise, you too? Isn't it bad enough that those peasants outside are laughing at me? Must you join them?'
'My love, I'm not laughing at you. It was - Cavalcanti's face! Do you know, I believe that up until he saw us he really thought that you would be pleased to have him - and now he understands that you despise him.' She buried her face in her hands, once again overcome with mirth, and then added, 'And do you remember that song we used to sing? Signor Vaccaj's intervals of thirds?'
'Which was that?' Eugénie asked, distracted momentarily from her insult. She hummed a third, and said, 'Ah, yes. The turtledove.'
'The foolish turtledove, fleeing from the falcon, that finds itself into the hunter's snare. That was us - almost.'
'Ah, but the hunter was himself hunted,' Eugénie said, smiling. 'Well, my turtledove, since you contrive to laugh about it, I shall do my best to see the funny side myself. And after all, we are still heading in the right direction - away from Paris, and towards our freedom.'
'You will have to change your clothes again,' Louise said after a little while. 'While my passport looks well enough made out to Léon d'Armilly travelling with his sister, I fear I'm not so good a forger that I can change that to Léonie without arousing suspicion when we come to the border.' She paused, a little afraid that Eugénie would not care to risk a double unmasking. 'Nor do I make nearly such a convincing Léon.'
'Very well,' Eugénie said, and she almost laughed.
The carriage bumped over the cobbles. They would be in Belgium by nightfall.
Lesson II
Intervals of Fourths
Lascia il lido e il mare infido
a solcar torna il nocchiero,
e pur sa che menzognero
altre volte l'inganno
1839
'Well, tesorina?' Eugénie asked the moment Louise returned from her audition. 'What did they say?'
Louise sank into a chair. 'The usual sort of thing. That I have an exceptional talent, but that there are two or three others who might suit as well or better, and if I perhaps display some special advantages – ugh.'
Eugénie's eyes flamed. 'How dare they!'
'I shall have to go back,' Louise said. 'Or, if not back, to another such. We can live perhaps three, four, years on the money we brought away with us, but what then? We cannot continue to live without work, without money. And I would rather earn my living singing than skivvying.'
'Where you would be equally likely to be molested. Men!' Eugénie said, with inexpressible contempt.
'What else is there to do? Lascia il lido... The sailor returns to the sea, though he knows it betrays him.'
'How I wish...' Eugénie began, and then, 'Yes! Louise, you shall go back once more and audition for Signor Colorni, and you will leave the rest of it to me.'
Intervals of Fifths
Avvezzo a vivere
senza conforto,
ancor nel porto
paventi il mar.
'I fear I have changed my mind,' Louise said. 'My resolve has deserted me.'
'With your protector at your side?' Eugénie said. 'Shame!' Once again she had cropped her hair short and donned a suit of men's clothes.
'Ah, but you won't be at my side – you'll be outside. And you know how it is: even when one is accustomed to hardship, it is difficult to leave the harbour and face the open sea.'
'Why such a change, chicken-heart?'
'Yesterday,' Louise said, 'I didn't believe that you would do this. Today – you seem bent upon it.'
Eugénie laughed. 'It's like this: whether this sailor of yours fears the sea or not, he still has to go out upon it. You and I, we must earn our living, and this is the only way to stop this nonsense. Therefore – onwards!'
Lesson III
Intervals of Sixths
Bella prova è d'alma forte
l'esser placida e serena
nel soffrir l'inguista pena
d'una colpa che non ha.
She sang Come dolce all'alma mia, and she knew that she had not sung it well. In order to keep her composure, her mind had clung to a much simpler piece: Vaccaj's exercise featuring intervals of sixths. 'It is a beautiful proof of a strong soul,' she murmured to herself, 'to be placid and serene, suffering the unjust pain of a guilt one does not have.'
For Colorni was smiling, an oily smile that assumed things about Louise that were not true. 'As I said last week, Signorina d'Armilly, you have a substantial talent, one that I would be delighted to cultivate, subject to our coming to a... mutually satisfying agreement.'
Inwardly, Louise shuddered, but her countenance remained calm as she said, 'What kind of agreement were you thinking of, Signor Colorni?'
One must, after all, give him enough rope to hang himself.
'Come, come, my dear, you must know that very few auditions are concluded without... well, that is to say, our artistes must not only be mere singers, but must be actors, too, capable of great passion...'
'I've heard enough,' Louise said. She rose to leave and coughed twice. That was the signal.
'Oh, Signorina d'Armilly, be reasonable!'
At that moment the door burst open and Eugénie, looking every inch the furious young gentleman, dashed into the room.
'Sir, you have insulted my sister!' she exclaimed. 'I demand satisfaction!'
And indeed, Eugénie had in her hand a small pistol, that appeared to be none the less deadly for that.
Colorni turned white, but managed to say, 'I wonder that you are her brother, for I never saw two siblings look less alike.'
'And that's twice!' Eugénie exclaimed. 'She's my step-sister. What's that to you?'
'Well, I...'
'Pistols?' Eugénie said. 'Or do you prefer the sword?'
'Neither! That is, either... but really, my good boy, you can't be of age; it would be most dishonourable of me to fight you.'
Eugénie smiled as if she had not heard him, and looked thoughtfully at the pistol. All the while, Colorni grew whiter.
At last, Louise said, 'Come, Léon. I believe there's little use in our staying here.'
'Very well,' Eugénie said, though proving her own acting talent with a convincing show of reluctance, and followed Louise to the door. Then she turned and said, 'But remember, Signor, it was not I who refused to fight...'
Lesson IV
Intervals of Sevenths
Fra l'ombre un lampo solo
basta al nocchier sagace,
che gia ritrova il polo
gia riconcosce il mar.
'Now what do we do?' Louise asked.
A smile had been playing round Eugénie's lips since they had left Colorni. Now it grew broader. 'Now, cucciola mia,' she said, 'we go to the Teatro Fenice.'
A single light is enough to show the sailor the true direction, and he sees his way across the sea he traverses.
**
'Colorni refused to fight?' said Vincenzi, manager of the Fenice. 'Oh, that's priceless!' He threw his head back and roared with laughter.
'We thought that you might find that amusing,' Eugénie said, 'and so, before we told anyone else, we came to you. After all, it would be quite a coup for you, wouldn't it, to engage the woman that your great rival was afraid to fight?'
'Forgive me, signorina – I was under the impression that the other lady was the singer?'
'Mlle de Servieux,' (for Eugénie had appropriated her mother's maiden name) 'was my pupil,' Louise explained. 'She is a singer of great talent and character. And indeed, you might see your way to engaging the pair of us. You would not regret it.'
'I will not do anything of the sort -' Vincenzi said – 'without first hearing you sing. But, as it happens, I am looking to revive Tancredi within the next few months. That scheme of yours, Signorina de Servieux, was worthy of that noble gentleman; Signorina d'Armilly, you could make an adorable Amenaide. And,' he twinkled, 'as you say, it would be one in the eye for Colorni.'
Intervals of Octaves
Quell'onda che ruina
balza, si frange e mormora,
ma limpida si fa.
And so began the operatic career of Signorina Louise D'Armilly and Signorina Eugénie de Servieux. Tancredi (in the version with the happy ending) was a roaring success: the singing was magnificent, the love scenes touching, and the general spectacle divine. The two ladies, already known throughout Naples for being both eccentric and (what is essential if one chooses to be eccentric) rich, now became famous throughout Italy.
(History does not record whether or not Baron Danglars, now settled in obscurity in Rome, ever learned of his daughter's success, or, rather, that it was his daughter who was so successful.)
Eugénie took lessons in both fencing and in the use of firearms 'for,' she said, 'one never knows when Colorni may think better of turning down my offer to fight. And the fencing at least proves useful on the stage.' She was a great sensation, lauded particularly for her interpretation of Bellini's Romeo, Handel's Julius Caesar, and Rossini's Falliero, besides, of course, his Tancredi.
Louise, more reclusive than her dear friend, became none the less fêted in the world of the opera. Unlike Eugénie, she rarely sang en travesti, but excelled as the high soprano heroine. Much to her delight, she was also able to take on a couple of pupils at the same time, and contribute to the development of a new generation of singers.
The mountain stream tumbles down the Alpine heights, falling, falling, with a noise of thunder, but underneath it flows in a clear current. So it was with Eugénie and Louise, whose lives, on the surface a confection of operatic tinsel, were grounded in a love that was deep and enduring.
The Scale
Manca sollecita
più dell'usato,
anchorche s'agiti
conlieve fiato,
face che palpita
presso al morir
1836
'What's this?' Eugénie asked. 'A new way of singing scales?'
'More or less,' Louise said. 'M. Neuchâtel sent it to me.' She showed Eugénie the cover.
'Metodo pratico di canto italiano per camera,' Eugénie read. “'A Practical Method of Italian Singing for the Chamber'.” She flicked through the book. 'It's rather below your level, surely?'
'Certainly. But if for any reason I'm unsuccessful on the stage, I could teach singing – as a profession, I mean, rather than simply for your amusement. It would come in useful as a textbook.'
'Indeed, if you are teaching rich young ladies with no aspirations towards serious singing.'
'It's rather below your level, too,' Louise said sweetly. 'If we'd had it when you first started learning to sing it would have been very useful, but you have long passed that stage. Still, it couldn't hurt to go through it – for after all, you are still a rich young lady.'
'Oh, Louise, if you knew how I long to -'
'To what?'
'To be like you. To live for nothing but my art, to leave this wearying round of men and money! Indeed, I had much rather teach rich young ladies than be one! At least I should then feel that I was contributing something to my muse.'
Louise smiled. 'Very few artists – Mozart excepted; one must always except Mozart – had contributed much by the age of fifteen.'
Eugénie was not to be placated. 'I see my life stretched out before me – an interminable scale, one dull note after another. First the suitors, then the marriage, then the children - and all punctuated by dull women discussing their dull lives!'
'One has to sing scales,' Louise said, feebly.
'Signor Vaccaj seems to think not,' Eugénie said, indicating the Practical Method. 'See this - why, it was years before you let me attempt an acciacatura! And here he introduces it in lesson eight.'
'Why, you said yourself - this method is not for those who wish to be serious singers, but only those who wish to make a charming noise in the drawing room.'
'That's true,' Eugénie said, mollified by the implication. She looked more closely at the first exercise. 'How would you translate this, do you think?'
'Italian is not my strong point, as well you know,' Louise said. 'I know enough for music, and my pronunciation is acceptable, but I am not sure that I could produce a respectable translation. However, since you insist, something like this: a candle flame, beginning to flicker even more than usual, is restored by the action of a light breath, though it was close to dying.'
'That's close,' Eugénie said. 'Close, but not exactly right. I think you have the opposite sense from what the poet intended. He is saying that a light breath makes the flame flicker. But then you are an optimist.'
'Am I?' Louise murmured. 'Am I indeed?'
'Say, for example,' Eugénie said, 'that the poet, Signor Metastasio, speaks not of a literal candle flame, but of the fire that burns within the heart...'
'What then?'
'Well, in my translation, a tiny setback, a doubt or a fear, is enough to extinguish that flame. In yours, the lover is not daunted by that doubt, but loves the more fervently. I believe -'
'Yes?'
'I believe,' Eugénie said, 'that I prefer yours.' And she bent and kissed Louise on the lips.
Intervals of Thirds
Semplicetta tortorella,
che non vede il suo periglio,
per fuggir da crudo artiglio
vola in grembo al cacciator.
1838
Eugénie lowered the blinds but, even though she could no longer see, she still could hear, and the sound of sniggering reached her.
'Oh, why is the world not a desert?' she exclaimed, throwing herself into Louise's arms.
As the barouche rolled away from the Bell and Bottle, Louise did her best to keep from laughing, but at length the desire overwhelmed her. Eugénie sprang away from her, hurt.
'Louise, you too? Isn't it bad enough that those peasants outside are laughing at me? Must you join them?'
'My love, I'm not laughing at you. It was - Cavalcanti's face! Do you know, I believe that up until he saw us he really thought that you would be pleased to have him - and now he understands that you despise him.' She buried her face in her hands, once again overcome with mirth, and then added, 'And do you remember that song we used to sing? Signor Vaccaj's intervals of thirds?'
'Which was that?' Eugénie asked, distracted momentarily from her insult. She hummed a third, and said, 'Ah, yes. The turtledove.'
'The foolish turtledove, fleeing from the falcon, that finds itself into the hunter's snare. That was us - almost.'
'Ah, but the hunter was himself hunted,' Eugénie said, smiling. 'Well, my turtledove, since you contrive to laugh about it, I shall do my best to see the funny side myself. And after all, we are still heading in the right direction - away from Paris, and towards our freedom.'
'You will have to change your clothes again,' Louise said after a little while. 'While my passport looks well enough made out to Léon d'Armilly travelling with his sister, I fear I'm not so good a forger that I can change that to Léonie without arousing suspicion when we come to the border.' She paused, a little afraid that Eugénie would not care to risk a double unmasking. 'Nor do I make nearly such a convincing Léon.'
'Very well,' Eugénie said, and she almost laughed.
The carriage bumped over the cobbles. They would be in Belgium by nightfall.
Lesson II
Intervals of Fourths
Lascia il lido e il mare infido
a solcar torna il nocchiero,
e pur sa che menzognero
altre volte l'inganno
1839
'Well, tesorina?' Eugénie asked the moment Louise returned from her audition. 'What did they say?'
Louise sank into a chair. 'The usual sort of thing. That I have an exceptional talent, but that there are two or three others who might suit as well or better, and if I perhaps display some special advantages – ugh.'
Eugénie's eyes flamed. 'How dare they!'
'I shall have to go back,' Louise said. 'Or, if not back, to another such. We can live perhaps three, four, years on the money we brought away with us, but what then? We cannot continue to live without work, without money. And I would rather earn my living singing than skivvying.'
'Where you would be equally likely to be molested. Men!' Eugénie said, with inexpressible contempt.
'What else is there to do? Lascia il lido... The sailor returns to the sea, though he knows it betrays him.'
'How I wish...' Eugénie began, and then, 'Yes! Louise, you shall go back once more and audition for Signor Colorni, and you will leave the rest of it to me.'
Intervals of Fifths
Avvezzo a vivere
senza conforto,
ancor nel porto
paventi il mar.
'I fear I have changed my mind,' Louise said. 'My resolve has deserted me.'
'With your protector at your side?' Eugénie said. 'Shame!' Once again she had cropped her hair short and donned a suit of men's clothes.
'Ah, but you won't be at my side – you'll be outside. And you know how it is: even when one is accustomed to hardship, it is difficult to leave the harbour and face the open sea.'
'Why such a change, chicken-heart?'
'Yesterday,' Louise said, 'I didn't believe that you would do this. Today – you seem bent upon it.'
Eugénie laughed. 'It's like this: whether this sailor of yours fears the sea or not, he still has to go out upon it. You and I, we must earn our living, and this is the only way to stop this nonsense. Therefore – onwards!'
Lesson III
Intervals of Sixths
Bella prova è d'alma forte
l'esser placida e serena
nel soffrir l'inguista pena
d'una colpa che non ha.
She sang Come dolce all'alma mia, and she knew that she had not sung it well. In order to keep her composure, her mind had clung to a much simpler piece: Vaccaj's exercise featuring intervals of sixths. 'It is a beautiful proof of a strong soul,' she murmured to herself, 'to be placid and serene, suffering the unjust pain of a guilt one does not have.'
For Colorni was smiling, an oily smile that assumed things about Louise that were not true. 'As I said last week, Signorina d'Armilly, you have a substantial talent, one that I would be delighted to cultivate, subject to our coming to a... mutually satisfying agreement.'
Inwardly, Louise shuddered, but her countenance remained calm as she said, 'What kind of agreement were you thinking of, Signor Colorni?'
One must, after all, give him enough rope to hang himself.
'Come, come, my dear, you must know that very few auditions are concluded without... well, that is to say, our artistes must not only be mere singers, but must be actors, too, capable of great passion...'
'I've heard enough,' Louise said. She rose to leave and coughed twice. That was the signal.
'Oh, Signorina d'Armilly, be reasonable!'
At that moment the door burst open and Eugénie, looking every inch the furious young gentleman, dashed into the room.
'Sir, you have insulted my sister!' she exclaimed. 'I demand satisfaction!'
And indeed, Eugénie had in her hand a small pistol, that appeared to be none the less deadly for that.
Colorni turned white, but managed to say, 'I wonder that you are her brother, for I never saw two siblings look less alike.'
'And that's twice!' Eugénie exclaimed. 'She's my step-sister. What's that to you?'
'Well, I...'
'Pistols?' Eugénie said. 'Or do you prefer the sword?'
'Neither! That is, either... but really, my good boy, you can't be of age; it would be most dishonourable of me to fight you.'
Eugénie smiled as if she had not heard him, and looked thoughtfully at the pistol. All the while, Colorni grew whiter.
At last, Louise said, 'Come, Léon. I believe there's little use in our staying here.'
'Very well,' Eugénie said, though proving her own acting talent with a convincing show of reluctance, and followed Louise to the door. Then she turned and said, 'But remember, Signor, it was not I who refused to fight...'
Lesson IV
Intervals of Sevenths
Fra l'ombre un lampo solo
basta al nocchier sagace,
che gia ritrova il polo
gia riconcosce il mar.
'Now what do we do?' Louise asked.
A smile had been playing round Eugénie's lips since they had left Colorni. Now it grew broader. 'Now, cucciola mia,' she said, 'we go to the Teatro Fenice.'
A single light is enough to show the sailor the true direction, and he sees his way across the sea he traverses.
**
'Colorni refused to fight?' said Vincenzi, manager of the Fenice. 'Oh, that's priceless!' He threw his head back and roared with laughter.
'We thought that you might find that amusing,' Eugénie said, 'and so, before we told anyone else, we came to you. After all, it would be quite a coup for you, wouldn't it, to engage the woman that your great rival was afraid to fight?'
'Forgive me, signorina – I was under the impression that the other lady was the singer?'
'Mlle de Servieux,' (for Eugénie had appropriated her mother's maiden name) 'was my pupil,' Louise explained. 'She is a singer of great talent and character. And indeed, you might see your way to engaging the pair of us. You would not regret it.'
'I will not do anything of the sort -' Vincenzi said – 'without first hearing you sing. But, as it happens, I am looking to revive Tancredi within the next few months. That scheme of yours, Signorina de Servieux, was worthy of that noble gentleman; Signorina d'Armilly, you could make an adorable Amenaide. And,' he twinkled, 'as you say, it would be one in the eye for Colorni.'
Intervals of Octaves
Quell'onda che ruina
balza, si frange e mormora,
ma limpida si fa.
And so began the operatic career of Signorina Louise D'Armilly and Signorina Eugénie de Servieux. Tancredi (in the version with the happy ending) was a roaring success: the singing was magnificent, the love scenes touching, and the general spectacle divine. The two ladies, already known throughout Naples for being both eccentric and (what is essential if one chooses to be eccentric) rich, now became famous throughout Italy.
(History does not record whether or not Baron Danglars, now settled in obscurity in Rome, ever learned of his daughter's success, or, rather, that it was his daughter who was so successful.)
Eugénie took lessons in both fencing and in the use of firearms 'for,' she said, 'one never knows when Colorni may think better of turning down my offer to fight. And the fencing at least proves useful on the stage.' She was a great sensation, lauded particularly for her interpretation of Bellini's Romeo, Handel's Julius Caesar, and Rossini's Falliero, besides, of course, his Tancredi.
Louise, more reclusive than her dear friend, became none the less fêted in the world of the opera. Unlike Eugénie, she rarely sang en travesti, but excelled as the high soprano heroine. Much to her delight, she was also able to take on a couple of pupils at the same time, and contribute to the development of a new generation of singers.
The mountain stream tumbles down the Alpine heights, falling, falling, with a noise of thunder, but underneath it flows in a clear current. So it was with Eugénie and Louise, whose lives, on the surface a confection of operatic tinsel, were grounded in a love that was deep and enduring.
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