A lost queen, a desperate woman, a mad female singer: researching the voice of Monteverdi’s Ottavia through vocal sounds , sighs and observations on Nothingness

• Abstract: With the musical manuscript of Claudio Monteverdi’s opera L’Incoronazione di Poppea in my hand, I search for vocal colors of lamentation and madness. Thorugh the vocal part of Ottavia I meet sounding paradoxes and multiple levels of identity. Silent observation was the preparatory method of the first performing Ottavia in 1643, the roman singer Signora Anna Renzi. Every sound that came out of her body, seemed not memorized but born at the very moment. Something made her performance different from everything else heard or seen on stage. She entered along with a new genre: the public opera. She was considered a symbol for Nothingness. In a 17th century costume based on a portrait of Anna Renzi, I allow my own vocal instrument, embodied by MIND, BODY & VOICE, to enter stage. In dialoue the Chorus of OTHER (various references) my journey through the manuscript introduces new sensations of practical physicality, emotions & passions, intimacy & wholenss of being through experiences as well as theories of Nothingness. The two lamentations I address in this lecture-performance, Addio Roma and Disprezzata Regina, tells about a desperate woman having to leave her love, her home and her life. But at the same time Ottavia’s words reflect the sorrow and pain of a 17th century female singer having to leave her home, her family and her life in Rome, being banned from stages by the Pope. The words and sounds of Ottavia become analogue with my own sensuous experience of having to leave home and family behind. When MIND meet VOICE and BODY from inside Ottavia, the 17th century score become alive. Words, notes, practice and theory become references and brings me back in history, meanwhile they make me observe my own presence in the moment of performance.

Subject headings

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Medie- och kommunikationsvetenskap -- Kommunikationsvetenskap (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Media and Communications -- Communication Studies (hsv//eng)

HUMANIORA  -- Annan humaniora -- Kulturstudier (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- Other Humanities -- Cultural Studies (hsv//eng)

HUMANIORA  -- Konst (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- Arts (hsv//eng)

HUMANIORA  -- Konst -- Musik (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- Arts -- Music (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Voice

17th century Opera

Monteverdi

Ottavia

Ornamentation

Lamentation. Madness

Nothingness

Vocal performance practice

17:th century opera

Artistic Research

Anna Renzi

Venice

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

kon (subject category)