Judit Zsovár
Anna Maria Strada,
Prima Donna of G. F. Handel
Bibliographic Information published by the
Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche
Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data is available online at
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
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Library of Congress.
This publication was funded by the Hungarian Handel Society as well as
several private individuals.
Cover Illustration: Judit Zsovár, Strada (2018)
ISBN 978-3-631-79243-8 (Print)
E-ISBN 978-3-631-81290-7 (E-PDF)
E-ISBN 978-3-631-81291-4 (EPUB)
E-ISBN 978-3-631-81292-1 (MOBI)
DOI 10.3726/b16691
© Peter Lang GmbH
Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften
Berlin 2020
All rights reserved.
Peter Lang – Berlin ∙ Bern ∙ Bruxelles ∙ New York ∙ Oxford ∙ Warszawa ∙ Wien
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This publication has been peer reviewed.
About the author
Judit Zsovár gained her doctorate in musicology at the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music in Budapest and has been awarded the Handel Institute Research as well as Conference grants, the DAAD-, and the Zoltán Kodály scholarships. She holds publications in four languages about Baroque opera singers as well as the soprano sfogato voice. As a soprano soloist, she appeared, inter alia, at the Vienna Konzerthaus, the Handel House in London, and the Helsinki Music Centre.
About the book
George Frideric Handel’s longest continuous collaboration with a leading singer took place between 1729 and 1737 with Anna Maria Strada del Pò (1703–1775), a soprano who may have sung ‘entirely di petto’; that is, with a chest-like vocal production in the head range as well: powerfully and sonorously. The investigation of her peculiar vocal features and career, in connection with the music written for her by Handel and other composers, involved musicological research methods and findings of the historically informed performance practice. The conclusions rest on three main pillars: musical sources; surviving descriptions of her singing; and period treatises, completed with the author’s practical experiences as a classical singer.
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To Alps
Contents
The 1720/1721 season at Sant’Angelo
Naples, the operatic capital of Europe
Chapter Three: Successor to the ‘Rival Queens’
Social, political, and financial matters
Chapter Four: In the Midst of Operatic Business
