# Would you classify this as Bel Canto? "Questo vago giovinetto" (Paisiello). Why or Why Not? What would you consider as the earliest Bel Canto opera?



## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)




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## ColdGenius (9 mo ago)

I would say it's very classic. But I'm not a musicologist or art historian. It's a kind of favorite amateurish game, guess the style / epoch / painter or school in a museum.


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## BBSVK (10 mo ago)

Maybe somewhat like Jommelli ? Neapoletan school ? Classicist, but you get the feel, bel canto is going to be built on it ?
I checked wikipedia now, it doesn't say Neapoletan school, but Naples is in his CV.
I checked Jommelli, he is older, but the minimim I know (= one opera) suits me better than this aria. Jommelli feels closer to bel canto. I don't know how to describe the features though. It might be also influenced by the way of singing.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

BBSVK said:


> Jommelli feels closer to bel canto.


What examples in Jommelli do you have in mind? (That are not just Baroque-influenced coloratura)


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## BBSVK (10 mo ago)

hammeredklavier said:


> What examples in Jommelli do you have in mind? (That are not just Baroque-influenced coloratura)


All I know is single opera I have seen and listened afterwards to it on youtube. It is "La cantata e disfida di Don Trastulo". The resulting impression might have been influenced by the style of singing.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

Bel canto is a term that has been used to decribe a number of operas from Handel (and possibly even before) to mid Verdi. If bel canto is pre-Wagnerian singing of the Italian school, then yes it is. If bel canto is solely a period that started with Rossini and ended with Verdi then no, it wouldn't be. In reality, music mostly evolves and develops bit by bit and it's hard to draw a line. 

Bellini, whilst being a bel canto composer, looks back to the classical era (think of the similarities between Norma and La Vestale). Paisiello isn't that disimilar to Bellini in a couple of the arias in Nina (and I think those sound more like early Rossini/Bellini than this aria does).

In conclusion, no I wouldn't call this aria a bel canto aria, perhaps some of Paisiello's works along with Spontini's could be considered proto-bel canto? I think that the vitality of Rossini's works was truly something quite different, despite growing out of the classical style.

N.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

The Conte said:


> I wouldn't call this aria a bel canto aria


There's still something about it that strikingly reminds me of the so-called "Bel Canto" practice, rather than Mozart, for instance. The embellishments starting at 2:05, for example.


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## The Conte (May 31, 2015)

I've considered and done some thinking on this and whilst I can't be certain what the first bel canto opera is, Tancredi? I think that the music of Mozart, Cimarosa and Paisiello all has more in common with each others' in terms of style, than that of Beethoven, Cherubini or Spontini or that of Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti. These two latter groups have far more in common with the others of their group than they do with those in the other groups (and I'm only thinking about style of the music here).

N.


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