Coloratura has several meanings. The word derives from the Italian colorare (to colour; to heighten; to enliven) or colorazione (colouring, coloration).
Its most well-known meaning is applied to voice type - i. e. , the coloratura soprano, most famously typified by the rôle of Queen of the Night in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte. A coloratura soprano is a type of operatic Soprano who specializes in music that is distinguished by agile runs and leaps The Magic Flute (German Die Zauberflöte, K 620 is an Opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart [1]. This type of soprano has a high range and can execute with great facility the style of singing that includes elaborate ornamentation and embellishment, including running passages and trills. Other voice types may also be masters of coloratura technique, but the term coloratura when used without further qualification means soprano coloratura. Richard Miller names two types of soprano coloratura voices (the coloratura and the dramatic coloratura)[2] as well as a mezzo-soprano coloratura voice[3], and although he does not mention the coloratura contralto, he includes mention of specific works requiring coloratura technique for the contralto voice[4].
The musicological meaning of coloratura is most specifically applied to the elaborate and florid figuration or ornamentation in classical (18th century) and romantic (19th century, specifically bel canto) vocal music. Classical music is a broad term that usually refers to mainstream music produced in or rooted in the traditions of Western liturgical and Secular music Romantic Music is a Musicological term referring to a particular period theory compositional practice and canon in European music history from about 1815 to 1910 Bel canto ( Bel-Canto) ( Italian, "beautiful singing" an Italian musical term refers to the art and science of vocal technique which originated in Coloration, a closely associated term, includes this meaning of coloratura, but also includes the florid ornaments written out for keyboard instruments and lute music. In Music, ornaments are musical flourishes that are not necessary to carry the overall line of the melody (or harmony but serve instead to decorate or "ornament" A keyboard instrument is any musical instrument played using a Musical keyboard. Lute can refer generally to any plucked string instrument with a neck (either Fretted or unfretted and a deep round back or more specifically to an instrument from Early music (music of the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries) includes a substantial body of music for which coloratura technique is required by vocalists and instrumentalists alike. This type of coloratura was first defined in several early non-Italian music dictionaries, like the works by Michael Praetorius in Syntagma Musicum (1618), Sébastien de Brossard in his Dictionnaire de musique (1703) and Johann Gottfried Walther in his Musicalisches Lexicon (1732), in which the term is dealt with briefly and refers to the word's Italian usage. Michael Praetorius (probably February 15 1571 &ndash February 15 1621 was a German Composer, organist, and writer about Music. Sébastien de Brossard was a French and music theorist who was born in Dompierre Orne, France on September 12 1655 and died at Meaux April 10 1730 Johann Gottfried Walther ( September 18, 1684 &ndash March 23, 1748) was a German music theorist, organist, [5].
Christoph Bernhard defined it in two ways:
- cadenza: ‘runs which are not so exactly bound to the bar, but which often extend two, three or more bars further [and] should be made only at chief closes’ (Von der Singe-Kunst, oder Maniera, c1649);[5]
- diminution: ‘when an interval is altered through several shorter notes, so that, instead of one long note, a number of shorter ones rush to the next note through all kinds of progressions by step or leap’ (Tractatus compositionis, c1657). Christoph Bernhard was born on 1 January, 1628, in Kolberg, Pomerania, and died on 14 November, 1692, in Dresden In Music, a cadenza (Italian for cadence) is generically an improvised or written-out ornamental passage played or sung by a soloist or soloists usually Diminution, from Italian diminuimento, is a musical term used to mean different things in the context of melodies and intervals or chords. [5]
In the most famous Italian texts on singing (Caccini, 1601/2; Tosi, 1723; Mancini, 1774; García, 1841), coloratura is never used; it is also absent from the vocabulary of English authors as such as Burney and Chorley, who wrote extensively about Italian singing at the time when ornamentation was of utmost importance. [5]
Strictly speaking, the term coloratura is not restricted to describing any one range of voice. In spite of its derivation from the word colorare or colorazione, it does not specify changing the tonal colour of the voice for expressive purposes (that is Voix sombrée)[5] or the English term colouring the voice. There are coloratura parts for all voice types in different musical genres:
- Mozart's Allelujah (from Exsultate, jubilate) may be arranged for and sung by a properly trained contralto, mezzo soprano or soprano. A genre (ˈʒɑːnrə also /ˈdʒɑːnrə/ from French "kind" or "sort" from Latin: genus (stem gener-) is a loose set Exsultate Jubilate K 165 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was written in 1773. This article is related to a series of articles under the main article Voice type. This article is related to a series of articles under the main article Voice type. This article is related to a series of articles under the main article Voice type. The piece was written for soprano castrato. A castrato is a man with a singing voice equivalent to that of a Soprano, Mezzo-soprano, or Contralto voice produced either by Castration
- The aria Every Valley Shall be Exalted from Handel's Messiah is an example of a coloratura piece for tenor. This article is about the musical term "aria" For other meanings or uses of the word see Aria (disambiguation. Messiah ( HWV 56 is an Oratorio by George Frideric Handel based on a Libretto by Charles Jennens. The tenor is the highest male voice within the Modal register, just above the Baritone voice
- Each character in Rossini's operas has to have a secure coloratura technique.
- Osmin, a character in Mozart's The Abduction from the Seraglio, is a coloratura role for a bass. Die Entführung aus dem Serail ( K 384; The Abduction from the Seraglio; also known as Il Seraglio) is an Opera Singspiel
See also
References
- ^ New Harvard Dictionary of Music, ed. Don Randel, p. 180
- ^ Training Soprano Voices, by Richard Miller. 2000, Oxford University Press, pp. 7-9)
- ^ Training Soprano Voices, by Richard Miller. 2000, Oxford University Press, pp. 12-13)
- ^ Training Soprano Voices, by Richard Miller. 2000, Oxford University Press, p. 13)
- ^ a b c d e OWEN JANDER, ELLEN T. HARRIS: 'Coloratura', Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Retrieved: 27th November 2006), from [1]
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