Home > Alessandro Moreschi

He was perhaps the best known castrato of his day after Domenico Mustafa, a former "Direttore Perpetuo" of the Sistine Chapel. Other famous castrati singers at this time were Domenico Salvatori and Giovanni Cesari.

Alessandro Moreschi was born, to a large family in the town of Montecompatrio . It was suggested that he was castrated around 1865, but it is uncertain what were the exact reasons for performing the procedure -- whether it was due to purely medical (such as scrotal herniaA hernia is the protrusion of an organ or tissue out of the body cavity in which it normally lies. By far the most common hernias develop in the abdomen, when a weakness in the abdominal wall evolves into a localized hole, or "defect", through which the p), or musical reasons.

Nevertheless, being now a castrato, he was appointed to the music school of Scuola di San Salvatore in Lauro, where he was discovered by Gaetano Capocci , who became his teacher. In 1873Events The United Kingdom declares war against Ghana's King Kofi KariKari, who was involved in the trading of slaves. The war ended by July and the British established the Gold Coast Colony. January 17 Indian Wars: First Battle of the Stronghold during th he was nominated as a primary soprano at the Chapel of Laterano. In 1883Events January January 16 The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, establishing the United States Civil service, is passed January 19 The first electric lighting system employing overhead wires begins service ( Roselle, New Jersey) It was built by Thomas E he was invited to join, and later same year admitted to the Capella Sistina, after being heard performing the role of Seraph in the oratorio Christus am Ölberg by Beethoven. At that time Moreschi's voice was a high soprano of extraordinary purity and agility, to such an extent that he was nicknamed "Angelo di Roma" and made soloist of the Capella Sistina by the pope.

In 1891Events January 1 ? Paying of old age pensions begins in Germany January 20 James Hogg becomes the first native Texan to be governor of that state. January 29 Liliuokalani proclaimed Queen of Hawaii March 9 ? 12 ? Powerful storm off England?s south coast; he was made a secretary of the Chapel. In 1898Events January 1 New York City annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York. The city is geographically divided into five boroughs: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx, and Staten Island. January 13 Emile Zola's J'accus Moreschi was promoted to the director of the choir, and two years later appeared singing in the funeral of Italian king Umberto I at the Pantheon.

In the spring of 1902Events January-April January 28 The Carnegie Institution is founded in Washington, DC with a $10 million gift from Andrew Carnegie. France, Loisy's L'evangile et l'Eglise which inaugurates the Modernist Crisis February 11 Police beat up universal suffrage Moreschi made the first of his phonographThe phonograph or gramophone was the most common device for playing recorded sound from the 1870s through the 1980s. Usage of these terms is somewhat different in British English and American English; see usage note below. In more modern usage, this devic recordings, singing on gramophone records for the Gramophone & Typewriter Company. He made additional recordings in 1904. In all he made 17 recordings, where 8 of these were solo. Moreschi was, apart from being a soloist and director of the chorus, also a singing teacher, mostly of young falsettists.

By March 1913 he retired from the Cappella Sistina to his home in Rome where he spent the rest of his life. He still performed under certain circumstances, such as under a mass celebration at the Capella Giulia in 1914. He was also a friend of a German writer Franz Habock , author of the extremely important "Die Kastraten und ihre Gesangskunst", who planned to cast Moreschi in reviving the Farinelli repertoire in 1914. However, the grand plan failed to became a reality due to several obstacles on the way - the war and the decay of Moreschi's voice has been suggested, yet Habock himself point out the main reason for the failure: Moreschi, as all the other Capella singers, was simply unqualified of singing the Baroque repertoire in a proper way.

Regarding Moreschi's appearance Habock have this to say, after seeing him in 1914:

Moreschi was of average hight and rather short in stature; he had no facial hairs and his chest was broad and overdeveloped. In his youth, when he sang the Seraph`s oratorio at the age of 25, his vocal range was from C` to E```. Now however, at the end of his career, his range is only from A to G``. Moreschi's speaking voice have a certain silverine quality to it, and reminds much of a high tenor. However, both his appearance and voice gives an impression of him still being a young person. (Moreschi was 56 years old at this time.)

In the spring of 1922 Moreschi caught pneumonia and died shortly afterwards at his home in Rome.