Brigida Banti (; c. 1757–1806), best known by her husband's surname and her stage-name, as Brigida Banti,She is often reported also as Brigida Giorgi Banti (or Banti Giorgi). was an Italian soprano.
Biography
Obscure beginnings Her origins are rather obscure and the data on her birth are very dubious: she is thought to have been born in Crema, Lombardy, but some sources say she may have been born in Monticelli d'Ongina, a village in the province of Piacenza, which is located nearer to Cremona, in 1756This is Carr's version; according to Caruselli editor's encyclopaedia (I, p. 97) and to the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Opera, the correct data are the ones reported in the present article, whereas Staccioli and Genesi date her birth at Monticelli d'Ongina back to 1755. or possibly in 1758. She is the daughter of Carlo Giorgi, a street mandolin player; she too started her career as a street singer, either following her father around, or, according to different accounts, joining in with the double-bassist Domenico Dragonetti, when he was still a boy.. The only established fact is that, in 1777–1778, on her travels around southern Europe, she reached Paris where a meeting with an important person in the profession completely was to change her life. However, sources are at variances as to the identity of that person. According to some of them, it was composer Antonio Sacchini, who quickly trained her and introduced to the Opéra Comique, while other sources suggest that she caught the attention of , the shortly to-be Director of the Académie Royale de Musique, and the Opéra ought to have been the theatre she was engaged for. Details about her Parisian sojourn are scant and uncertain.According to Carr and Staccioli, she might even have already made her debut at the Opéra in 1776 in an entr'acte in Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide; this version is also supported by , which specifies also the role performed by Banti (Diana). She moved to London at an undetermined date, and there she met dancer and choreographer Zaccaria Banti, whom she married in Amsterdam in 1779 and whose surname she adopted as her stage-name.
The great European career After dropping round in Vienna in 1780, Banti decided to return to Italy when she was engaged at the Teatro San Benedetto in Venice for the 1782–1783 carnival season. Her performances in the premières of Piramo e Tisbe by Francesco Bianchi (who was to become her favourite composer), and Attalo, re di Bitinia by Giuseppe Sarti, as well as in a revival of Bertoni's were very successful by all accounts, raising enthusiasm in a listener out of the ordinary, such as the Irish tenor Michael Kelly. After Venice, she later sang in Turin, Milan, in Venice again, and also, in 1786–1787, in Warsaw, where she performed in operas by Giordani, Persichini and Tarchi.Staccioli. Finally, in the same 1787, she arrived at Teatro San Carlo in Naples, where she created the role of Sofonisba in Bianchi's Scipione Africano, and also interpreted operas by Paisiello, Anfossi and Guglielmi. In 1789 Banti returned to Venice's Teatro San Benedetto where she was the first protagonist of Anfossi's Zenobia in Palmira, which became one of her favourite roles, as well as Semiramide, a character she created in Bianchi's La vendetta di Nino, at the end of the following year. In June 1792 she took part in the inauguration of the new theatre La Fenice in Venice, opposite the castrato Gaspare Pacchierotti (who exerted a strong artistic influence upon her throughout her career), in the first performance of Paisiello's I giuochi d'Agrigento.
After a brief season in Madrid in 1793, from 1794 to 1802 she was engaged, as the leading soprano, at London's King's Theatre, where she made her début as Semiramide in La vendetta di Nino. There she met Lorenzo Da Ponte, who later reported she had been vulgar, impudent, dissolute and even a drunkard. Specifically, he said that she was "ignorant, foolish and insolent", and that she "took to theatre, where only her voice had led her, all habitudes, manners and morals of an impudent Corisca".Corisca is a negative character in Guarini's Il pastor fido He also credited her with a sexual relationship with William Taylor, manager of the King's Theatre.Da Ponte, L., Memorie , digital edition. Quote: la Banti "era una femminaccia ignorante, sciocca e insolente, che, avvezza nella sua prima giovinezza a cantar pei caffè e per le strade, portò sul teatro, dove la sola voce la condusse, tutte le abitudini, le maniere e i costumi d'una sfacciata Corisca. Libera nel parlare, più libera nelle azioni, dedita alla crapola, alle dissolutezze ed alla bottiglia, appariva sempre quello che era in faccia di tutti, non conosceva misure, non aveva ritegni; e, quando alcuna delle sue passioni era stuzzicata dalle difficoltà o dalle opposizioni, diventava un aspide, una furia, un demone dell'inferno, che avrebbe bastato a sconvolgere tutto un impero, nonché un teatro". She also met and worked with Haydn in 1795. Haydn had written the concert aria ('New Scene') 'Berenice che fai' for her. Haydn was initially disappointed in her singing saying that “she sang very scanty”. However the premiere of the aria alongside Haydn’s London Symphony was really successful.
After getting back to Italy in 1802 autumn, owing to Elizabeth Billington's return to her country, she remained in demand on stage for some years both at La Scala and at la Fenice. With her health failing, her voice was getting more and more spoilt and she was forced to retire albeit very shortly before her premature death, in 1806. So marvellous and so powerful her very voice had been that her corpse was eventually subjected to an autopsy which revealed two extraordinarily large lungs.Celletti, La grana, "San Carlo e Scala", p. 66. She has a painted tomb monument at the Certosa of Bologna.Tomb at the Certosa di Bologna. Her son Giuseppe would publish a short biography of her, some sixty years later, in 1869.
Critical response Despite a lack of classical or theoretical training, Banti's performance was well-received by her contemporaries. Lord Mount Edgcumbe wrote of her in his book Musical Reminiscences: "Her voice was of most extensive compass, rich and even, and without a fault in its whole range – a true voce di petto throughout".Mount Edgcumbe, R, Musical Reminiscences of an Old Amateur Chiefly Respecting Italian Opera in England for Fifty Years from 1773 to 1823, London, 1824, quoted by Grove Dictionary , I, p. 304.
Her singing style, according to Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, was very similar to the castrato Pacchiarotti in its "expressive intensity".Caruselli (ed.), Enciclopedia, I, p. 98.
Roles created and significant performances The following is a list of significant performances of Banti's career (either world or local premieres).
RoleOperaGenreComposerTheatrePremière's dateEmirenaAttalo Re di Bitiniadramma per musica (opera seria)Giuseppe SartiVenice, Teatro (Gallo) San Benedetto26 December 1782TisbePiramo e Tisbedramma per musicaFrancesco BianchiVenice, Teatro (Gallo) San Benedetto3 January 1783IppodamiaBriseidedramma per musica (opera seria)Francesco Bianchi Turin, Nuovo Teatro Regio27 December 1783EmiraAmaionnedramma per musicaTurin, Nuovo Teatro Regio24 January 1784AriannaBacco e Ariannafesta teatrale (cantata)Angelo TarchiTurin, Nuovo Teatro Regio20 May 1784AdelinaIl disertore francesedramma per musica (opera seria)Francesco BianchiVenice, Teatro (Gallo) San Benedetto26 December 1784CleofideAlessandro nell'Indiedramma per musica (opera seria)Francesco BianchiVenice, Teatro (Gallo) San Benedetto28 January 1785AriciaFedradramma per musicaGiovanni PaisielloNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo1 January 1788DeboraDebora e Sisaraazione sacra per musica (oratorio, 1st version)Pietro Alessandro GuglielmiNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo13 February 1788ArmidaIl Rinaldodramma per musicaNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo4 November 1788MarziaCatone in Uticadramma per musicaGiovanni PaisielloNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo1 January 1789ErismenaMontezumapastiche (dramma per musica)Giacomo Insanguine, Josef Myslivecek, Gian Francesco de Majo,Baldassarre Galuppi and Nicola ZingarelliVenice, Teatro (Venier) San BenedettoZenobiaZenobia di Palmiradramma per musica (opera seria, 1st version)Pasquale AnfossiVenice, Teatro (Venier) San Benedetto26 December 1789EuterpeL'armoniacantataPasquale AnfossiVenice, Teatro (Venier) San Benedetto11 January 1790ZenobiaZenobia in Palmiradramma per musicaGiovanni PaisielloNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo30 May 1790SemiramideLa vendetta di Ninodramma per musica (opera seria, 1st version)Francesco BianchiNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo12 November 1790CoraPizzarro nelle Indieopera seriaMarcello Bernardini "Marcello da Capua"Naples, Real Teatro San Carlo23 January 1791EmiliaLucio Papiriodramma per musica (opera seria)Naples, Real Teatro San Carlo30 May 1791BriseideBriseideoperaFerdinando RobuschiNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo13 August 1791AntigonaAntigonaopera seriaPeter von WinterNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo4 November 1791AchinoaGionataoratorio (azione sacra scenica)Niccolò PiccinniNaples, Real Teatro San Carlo4 March 1792AspasiaI giuochi d'Agrigentodramma per musica (1st version)Giovanni PaisielloVenice, Teatro alla Fenice (inauguration)16 May 1792AstasiaTarara o sia La virtù premiatadramma per musica (opera seria)Francesco BianchiVenice, Teatro alla Fenice26 December 1792InesInes de Castrodramma per musicaGiuseppe Giordani "Giordaniello"Venice, Teatro alla Fenice28 January 1793AlcesteAlceste ossia il trionfo dell' amor conjugaleopera seriaChristoph Willibald GluckLondon, King's Theatre in the Haymarket30 April 1795According to The Oxford Dictionary of Music (sixth edition, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2013, p. 14, ) and The New Grove Dictionary of Opera (article: "Alceste (ii)" by Jeremy Hayes, New York, Oxford University Press, 1997, I, p. 62, ), it was the British premiere of the Italian version of Gluck's opera. According however to a note appeared on the Chronicle of 28 April 1795 (cited in Theodore Fenner, Opera in London: Views of the Press, 1785–1830, Carbondale, Southern Illinois University Press, 1994, p. 104, ), "it was identical to the Paris production under Gluck".AntigonaAntigonaNot reported by Casaglia, but stated by Corago (University of Bologna).dramma per musicaFrancesco BianchiKing's Theatre Hay-Market24 May 1796EvelinaEvelina, or the Triumph of the English over the Romansserious operaAntonio SacchiniLondon, King's Theatre in the Haymarket10 January 1797Translation into Italian by Lorenzo Da Ponte of Sacchini's posthumous opera Arvire et Évélina (William Thomas Parke, Musical Memoirs: Comprising an Account of the General State of Music in England ..., London, Colburn & Bentley, 1830, I, p. 244 (copy at books.google).ZenobiaZenobiadramma per musica (opera seria)Richard Mount-EdgcumbeLondon, King's Theatre in the Haymarket22 May 1800InesInes de Castrodramma serio per musicaVittorio TrentoLeghorn, Imperial Regio Teatro degli Avvalorati9 November 1803Clearco (en travesti)I riti d'Efesodramma eroico per musicaGiuseppe FarinelliVenice, Teatro alla Fenice26 December 1803Arsace (en travesti)Arsace e Semiradramma eroico (opera seria)Venice, Teatro alla Fenice
Notes
Sources Bruce Carr, Banti, Brigida Giorgi, in Stanley Sadie (ed), The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, Oxford University Press, 1992, I, pp. 303–304 Salvatore Caruselli (ed), Grande enciclopedia della musica lirica, vol. 4, Longanesi & C. Periodici, Roma Rodolfo Celletti, Storia del belcanto, Discanto Edizioni, Fiesole, 1983 Rodolfo Celletti, La Grana della Voce. Opere, direttori e cantanti, Baldini & Castoldi, Milan, 2000 Lorenzo Da Ponte, Memorie, Bari, G. Laterza, 1918, now available free in a digital edition c/o Università degli studi di Roma La Sapienza (Biblioteca Italiana); original title: Memorie di Lorenzo da Ponte da Ceneda scritte da esso (New York, 1823–27, enlarged 2/1829–30)