rel="nofollow" href="#ulink_94cd82fa-f178-592e-bb02-f580c5f8361b">102 pointing to the possibility that the same arias were transposed upwards or maybe altered but without substitution. This seems all the more likely for at Sant’Angelo there were only given concert performances, presumably serving as a rushed substitution for the poorly received Filippo.
Strada’s last opera in Venice was Il pastor fido from Carlo Luigi Pietragrua, premiered at Sant’Angelo on 11 February 1721.103 That was a very busy carnival season for her as she appeared in no less than three productions during those few weeks. The avvisi define Il pastor fido as tragicomedia pastorale and claim that it was successful.104 Strada embodied Dorinda as seconda donna, but she was the first soprano, since the prima donna was Merighi. Pietragrua likewise displays her high tessitura and agility. The aria ‘Fuggi pur’ (II/2; G major, 3/8; Ex. 1.9) applies dance-like triple metre containing not only coloraturas but also a comparatively long sustained note, probably inspired by Strada’s superb messa di ←43 | 44→voce. ‘Dal tuo stral’ (IV/3; Ex. 1.10) is a dance movement, too: a gigue. Its triplet-rhythms seem to have suited her throat very well, and it could have provided an easy motion for her voice, so that she could naturally execute accented aʺ tones several times.
Example 1.9 Pietragrua: Il pastor fido – ‘Fuggi pur’, bars 28–66, vocal part
Example 1.10 ‘Dal tuo stral’, bars 70–84, vocal part
Finances
Financial relations in the world of eighteenth-century opera were widely disproportionate. The whole system was focused on singers, especially the castrati, and leading female roles, who earned the most. The composer less than half of it, and the librettist even less still. Singers received free lodgings, travel expenses, and costumes, not to mention a variety of special extras, such as jewels, flowers, and sonnets given by noble patrons and admirers. The ‘thousands of scudi’ mentioned in Il teatro as singers’ wages is not a hyperbole:105 a star prima donna like Faustina Bordoni earned 1,200 zecchini (equal to 4,258 ducats) in the 1724/25 season at S. G. Grisostomo, Antonia Merighi 1,900 ducats, and Rosaura Mazzanti’s salary was 12,750 lire (ca 2,056 ducats) at Sant’Angelo in the same season.106 Contrarily, a composer’s fee for an opera score was usually 200 ducats, which for a whole season (typically 3‒4 works) meant an annual salary of 600‒800 ducats. A seconda or terza donna’s pay per season was about 600 ducats, or 150‒200 ducats per production. As Strada sang in four operas at ←44 | 45→Sant’Angelo in 1720/21, her wages might have been around 700 ducats, considering her rank and debutant status.107
Besides her fellow singers at the Sant’Angelo company, Strada must have had opportunities to hear some of the most famous female voices of her era: those of the mezzo-soprano Faustina Bordoni, the lyric soprano Francesca Cuzzoni, and the contralto Diana Vico, who were all prominent members of operatic high society. They appeared together in Francesco Pollarolo’s Lucio Papirio dittatore, premiered on 26 December 1720, and in Orlandini’s Nerone, which ran from 11 February 1721. Sitting in one of the performances, Strada could hardly ever have imagined that four years later she would sing together with Vico and been paired with Farinelli, nor that in nine years she would have been the successor to the ‘rival queens’ Cuzzoni and Faustina in London under Handel, and been called a better one than the two together.
Milan, Livorno, and Lucca
For the upcoming birthday celebration of the Empress, Vivaldi’s pasticcio La Silvia (a dramma pastorale), was performed on 26 August 1721 at the Teatro Regio Ducale in Milan. The mythological plot focuses on Numitore, King of Alba’s bloodline. His daughter Silvia, despite being forced to become a Vestal virgin, conceives the twins Romulus and Remus (founders of Rome) by Mars, who disguised himself as the shepherd Tirsi. Strada embodied another nymph, named Nerina, a follower of Silvia, who fell in love with Niso. Later, upon seeing him embracing Silvia, she becomes furiously jealous (III/4, ‘Furie terribili’). Unfortunately the score of this aria is lost, but it would have been very informative to see what kinds of coloraturas were given to Strada by Vivaldi after a year of collaboration. In the end it turns out that Niso is none else but Silvia’s brother believed dead, Egisto.
The surviving part of Strada’s role has some very intriguing aspects. In her second aria, ‘Mio ben, s’io ti credessi’ (I/14, C minor, 2/4), Nerina is suspicious ←45 | 46→towards her beloved, because earlier that day Echo told her that Niso will betray her before sundown. This was the first time Vivaldi used Lombardic rhythm in his oeuvre.108 The pattern of two demisemiquavers (or one semiquaver) followed by a dotted quaver, connected to accented chromatic high notes (such as a↑ʺ, gʺ, fʺ), together with the text, serves as a tool for ironic expression. This was one of the two arias written entirely by Vivaldi’s own hand in the manuscript. La Silvia primarily contains arias from his earlier operas, which was the task of the copyist to prepare into a score. According to Strohm, these arias might have been part of an early draft for La Silvia.109 It is remarkable however, that Strada did not sing any of her earlier Vivaldian arias in a work where many numbers were taken from La verità. Nevertheless, when given the choice, Strada hardly ever repeated her earlier arias. Indeed, throughout her whole career, she regularly showed a preference for learning new movements over recycling older repertoire.
Strohm has also suggested that ‘Pronto servir’ (II/11; B↑ major, 2/4), suited to the text in its declamatory nature, gives ample space for acting, especially the use of gestures. Its unusual four-part non-da-capo form also strengthens this assumption.110 Nerina does not settle for less than true love: after she learns that Silvia’s beloved, Tirsi is still alive, she is not completely happy, because a true lover would not hurt his loved one as Tirsi torments Silvia. On stage, it seems that Strada might have been convincing not only as a singer but also as an actress. By this time Vivaldi must have known her performance abilities well. The thought, that the composer who later chose an artist like Anna Girò as his supreme prima donna, entrusted an aria to Strada in which she had limited vocal opportunities (but maximal visual ones), is revealing. Girò was namely a singer who inspired Vivaldi primarily through her sincere and touching way of acting. Furthermore, she was small in stature like Strada.
In Act II scene 4, Nerina feels compassion for Silvia and comforts her by singing ‘Nel suo carcere ristretto’ (Ex. 1.11), an aria in D major from Teuzzone (RV 736, Mantua 1718), originally performed by the soprano castrato Gasparo Geri(/Gieri) who embodyed Cino, a male character. It also occurrs as a tenor aria with the same text in Eurilla e Alcindo (Serenata a tre RV 690, 1719) and directly inspired the 3rd movement of the Autumn concerto (RV 283, F major) of 1720. It ←46 | 47→also resembles the D major flute concerto, Il Gardellino (RV 428, before 1724).111 This simile aria uses the picture of an imprisoned nightingale, who is not willing to sing about affections but rather producing lamenting songs of a freedom lost, as a metaphor.112
Example 1.11 Vivaldi: La Silvia – Section A of ‘Nel suo carcere ristretto’, bars 10‒35, vocal part