Domenico Donzelli

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Domenico Donzelli (born Bergamo 1790 - died Bologna 1873) was an Italian tenor. Donzelli had a very robust voice, famous for being able to reach up to high A in full chest voice. He made his name in 1815 when Rossini wrote for him the role of Torvaldo in his sixteenth opera, Torvaldo e Dorliska. It is as Pollione, in Bellini's Norma (1831), however, that Donzelli is most famous today, his large voice so different from that of Rubini's, for whom Bellini more frequently wrote his tenor heroes.

Donzelli created many roles, including Ruggiero (Emma d'Antiocha, 1834) and the title role in Il Bravo (1839) for Mercadante; Giulio Cesare (Cesare in Egitto, 1821) and the title role in Carlo di Borgogna (1835) for Pacini; and the title role in Ugo, conte di Parigi (1832) and Don Ruiz (Maria Padilla, 1841) for Donizetti.

Donzelli's style of singing had caused the death of a young rival, Americo Sbigoli. In trying to emulate him, Sbigoli burst a blood vessel in his throat which led to a haemorrhage.

It has been said that his voice was deteriorating by the time he took on Pollione in 1831, but he still received favourable reviews for his creation of Pacini's Carlo di Borgogna four years later. He retired from the stage in 1841, returning briefly in 1844 to sing at Naples.

Donzelli is also credited with the demise of the castrato in Italian opera. Throughout the 18th century, castrati were the only choice for the hero roles, some people declaring they couldn't imagine any other voice singing the lead. But when Donzelli arrived on the stage, the sound of his voice was so thrilling that it changed public opinion in favour of tenors. For a long time, though, his tenore robusto was largely unique, with the tenore di grazia being more favoured in opera writing. Giovanni Battista Rubini is perhaps the most famous of this group, he could easily rise to high E in a "mellifluous" head voice. It wasn't until the middle of the 19th century, when Verdi was the dominant composer in Italian opera, that Donzelli's style became the norm, simply because it needed a stronger voice to rise above the thicker orchestral textures being used.

[edit] Sources

• Warrack, John and West, Ewan (1992), The Oxford Dictionary of Opera, 782 pages, ISBN 0-19-869164-5