One God, so many Farinellis: Mythologising the Star Castrato

Abstract

Whatever divergent views scholars may hold about Farinelli, there is at least one point on which they agree: his legend was unrivalled among the cognoscenti of the eighteenth-century operatic stage. Testimony to Farinelli's supremacy assumed many forms, but perhaps its richest legacy left is the iconography which transmits his presence more immediately than any other historical record. No other mid-eighteenth-century singer's likeness proliferated with the volume, diversity or frequency of Farinelli's representations. That much is obvious: but what role did they play in his career?Addressing this question requires not only an accurate accounting of the range of Farinelli's iconography, but also a grasp of the motivations, relationships, and conventions underpinning each image's production and consumption. Assembled, these pictures can communicate to us the perhaps surprisingly modern story of a star being produced for and by a viewing public. Read from this perspective, the thematic evolution and varying distribution of the castrato's image themselves can be seen as tools of signification that interacted with other texts he mediated, including music.'To call a performer a 'star' implies a persona in the public sphere that has been deliberately constructed and that exercises a measure of control over the work ('star vehicle') that features it. Cinema scholars have developed a body of theory about star production to explain why stars are created, what the star embodies, and how the star's meaning interacts with that of the work as a whole, and these modern perspectives can help us understand the star-dominated enterprise of eighteenth-century opera.' This article will apply to Farinelli's iconography three queries central to cinematic star studies. First, what configuration of signsgraphic and linguisticdid a representation of Farinelli contain? Second, which conventions of representation shaped the production and consumption of this image, and how did they do so? Third, what meanings might spectators have attached to Farinelli's image? Such questions spring from twin findings central to film stars: that the star functions as a sign to be decoded in combination with other signs, and that images of the star are key signifiers within this process of de-coding. For Farinelli, the configuration, conventions and meanings of this code shifted according to the spheressemi-public, urban public or courtin which he performed.During Farinelli's early career in Italy, caricature dominated his pictorial representation. Caricature appears to have served chiefly to nourish a sense British Journalfor Eighteenth-Century Studies 28 (zoos), p.437-496 o BSECS o141-867X

‘The little that I have done is already gone and forgotten’:Farinelli and Burney Write Music History

“…A 1735 portrait by Amigoni, 27 for example, 'apotheosised the singer in a manner generally reserved for aristocratic portraiture' and pitched him as a modern Orpheus. 28 In addition to being publically exhibited in London alongside a portrait of Queen Caroline of England, the painting was engraved to enable the dissemination of Farinelli's ' "official" public image' by means of mass-produced prints. 29 The paintings of Farinelli from his Spanish period portray their subject in a similar manner.…”

Tall Histories: Height and Georgian Masculinities

“…63 Lack of testosterone also prevented bone joints hardening, so their ribcage continued to grow and their lungs were abnormally large: this helped them to perform their vocal acrobatics, but contributed to their distinctive physical appearance, which also included long limbs and small heads. 64 This is truly an example of where the body is plastic rather than being a biological constant.…”