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Faustina
Bordoni, an Italian mezzo-soprano, is most remembered for the
all-out cat-fight that she had with her greatest rival, Francesca
Cuzzoni, on the stage of the Royal Academy of Music in London, in the
middle of a performance, no less! (This scene was later
lampooned by John Gay in his Beggar’s Opera with the
"Jealousy Duet" between Polly and Lucy). Faustina and her
husband, Johan Adolph Hasse, were appointed to the Saxon court in Dresden
in 1731. She was a beautiful, slender woman, unlike her rival Cuzzoni,
and this helped to endear her to her public, and while Cuzzoni had
excellent rubato and portamento, Borodoni could sing higher, lighter, and
with more agility than any other singer in her day. |
