Giovanni Carestini was an Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 castrato

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 of the singer before puberty or one who, because of an endocrinological condition, never reaches sexual maturity.Castration before puberty prevents a boy's...

 of the 18th century, who sang in the opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

s and oratorio

Oratorio

An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...

s of George Frideric Handel

George Frideric Handel

George Frideric Handel was a German-British Baroque composer, famous for his operas, oratorios, anthems and organ concertos. Handel was born in 1685, in a family indifferent to music...

. He is also remembered as having sung for Johann Adolph Hasse

Johann Adolph Hasse

Johann Adolph Hasse was an 18th-century German composer, singer and teacher of music. Immensely popular in his time, Hasse was best known for his prolific operatic output, though he also composed a considerable quantity of sacred music...

 and Christoph Willibald Gluck

Christoph Willibald Gluck

Christoph Willibald Ritter von Gluck was an opera composer of the early classical period. After many years at the Habsburg court at Vienna, Gluck brought about the practical reform of opera's dramaturgical practices that many intellectuals had been campaigning for over the years...

.

Career

Carestini's career began in Milan in 1719, patronised at the time by the Cusani family (hence the alternative name Cusanino). He sang for Alessandro Scarlatti

Alessandro Scarlatti

Alessandro Scarlatti was an Italian Baroque composer especially famous for his operas and chamber cantatas. He is considered the founder of the Neapolitan school of opera. He was the father of two other composers, Domenico Scarlatti and Pietro Filippo Scarlatti.-Life:Scarlatti was born in...

 in Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

 in 1721. The scope of his burgeoning career quickly began to expand; he was at the Viennese

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

 court during 1723, and followed this up with performances in Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

, Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

 and Rome again, singing in operas by Hasse, Leonardo Vinci

Leonardo Vinci

Leonardo Vinci was an Italian composer, best known for his operas.He was born at Strongoli and educated at Naples under Gaetano Greco in the Conservatorio dei Poveri di Gesù Cristo. He first became known for his opere buffe in Neapolitan dialect in 1719; he also composed many opere serie...

, and Nicola Porpora

Nicola Porpora

Nicola Porpora was an Italian composer of Baroque operas and teacher of singing, whose most famous singing student was the castrato Farinelli. One of his other students was composer Matteo Capranica.-Biography:Porpora was born in Naples...

. He sang in Munich

Munich

Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

 in 1731 before coming to London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 to sing for Handel in 1733.

For Handel he sang the main roles in Arianna in Creta

Arianna in Creta

Arianna in Creta is an opera seria in three acts by George Frideric Handel. The Italian-language libretto was adapted by Francis Colman from Pietro Pariati's Arianna e Teseo, a text previously set by Nicola Porpora in 1727 and Leonardo Leo in 1729.-Performance history:The opera was first given at...

, Ariodante

Ariodante

Ariodante is an opera seria in three acts by Handel. The anonymous Italian libretto was based on a work by Antonio Salvi, which in turn was adapted from Canti 5 and 6 of Ludovico Ariosto's Orlando Furioso...

, and Alcina

Alcina

Alcina is an opera seria by George Frideric Handel. Handel used the libretto of L'isola di Alcina, an opera that was set in 1728 in Rome by Riccardo Broschi, which he acquired the year after, during his travels in Italy...

, and also performed in the oratorios Deborah

Deborah (Handel)

Deborah is an oratorio by George Frideric Handel. It was one of Handel's very early oratorios and was based on a libretto by Samuel Humphreys. It received its premiere performance at the King's Theatre in London on 17 March 1733....

, Esther, and Athalia. While in Naples in 1735, he commanded a fee higher than that of the renowned Caffarelli. Charles Burney

Charles Burney

Charles Burney FRS was an English music historian and father of authors Frances Burney and Sarah Burney.-Life and career:...

 records an entertaining anecdote from this time:

Following this peak, Carestini's career began to wane quickly. A London audience of 1740 was indifferent, and he returned to Italy in the early 1740s (singing in Gluck's Demofoonte

Demofoonte (Gluck)

Demofoonte is a dramma per musica or opera in 3 acts by composer Christoph Willibald Gluck. The work uses an Italian language libretto by Pietro Metastasio. The opera premiered on 6 January 1743 at the Teatro Regio Ducal in Milan.-Roles:...

in Milan in 1743), but was an employee of Maria Theresa

Maria Theresa of Austria

Maria Theresa Walburga Amalia Christina was the only female ruler of the Habsburg dominions and the last of the House of Habsburg. She was the sovereign of Austria, Hungary, Croatia, Bohemia, Mantua, Milan, Lodomeria and Galicia, the Austrian Netherlands and Parma...

 by 1744. From 1747-49 he sang for Hasse in Dresden

Dresden

Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....

, and then moved to Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

 (1750-54), and then St Petersburg (1754-56). Audiences in Naples were actively displeased by his performances in 1758, and Carestini seems to have died not long after. One of his last appearances was portraying the title role in the world premiere of Gaetano Latilla

Gaetano Latilla

Gaetano Latilla was an Italian opera composer, the most important of the period immediately preceding Niccolò Piccinni .Latilla was born in Bari, and studied at the Loreto Conservatory in Naples...

's Ezio

Ezio (Latilla)

Ezio is an opera eroica or "heroic" opera in 3 Acts by Gaetano Latilla. The opera uses an Italian language libretto by Pietro Metastasio. Metastasio's libretto was partly inspired by Jean Racine's play Britannicus and had earlier been set to music by George Frideric Handel in 1732...

at the Teatro di San Carlo

Teatro di San Carlo

The Real Teatro di San Carlo is an opera house in Naples, Italy. It is the oldest continuously active such venue in Europe.Founded by the Bourbon Charles VII of Naples of the Spanish branch of the dynasty, the theatre was inaugurated on 4 November 1737 — the king's name day — with a performance...

 on 10 July 1758.

Voice and reputation

The range of Carestini's voice changed throughout his career - he began as a "powerful and clear soprano

Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...

" (according to Burney), but later descended to "the fullest, finest, and deepest counter-tenor that has perhaps ever been heard" (again according to Burney). He was held in high regard by many critics across Europe. Hasse commented that "He who has not heard Carestini is not acquainted with the most perfect style of singing", while Quantz remarked that "He had extraordinary virtosity in brilliant passages, which he sang in chest voice, conforming to the principles of the school of Bernacchi

Antonio Bernacchi

Antonio Maria Bernacchi was an Italian castrato, composer, and teacher of singing. He studied with Francesco Antonio Pistocchi. His pupils included Farinelli, for a brief period during 1727, and the tenor Anton Raaff...

 and the manner of Farinelli

Farinelli

Farinelli , was the stage name of Carlo Maria Broschi, celebrated Italian castrato singer of the 18th century and one of the greatest singers in the history of opera.- Early years :...

". He was also reputed to be a fine actor, and was furthermore noted for his striking good looks. As a mark of his continuing impact upon operatic history, in 2007 French counter-tenor Philippe Jaroussky

Philippe Jaroussky

Philippe Jaroussky is a French sopranist countertenor. He began his musical career with the violin, winning an award at the Versailles conservatory and then took up the piano before turning to singing...

 released a CD tribute to Carestini, composed largely of aria

Aria

An aria in music was originally any expressive melody, usually, but not always, performed by a singer. The term is now used almost exclusively to describe a self-contained piece for one voice usually with orchestral accompaniment...

s written for Carestini's voice.