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Updated: June 6, 2025
The architecture, the simplicity of Venetian life and manners, the theatres from the opera-houses, where Pasta and Donzelli were singing, down to the national drama of Pulchinello the pictures, the sea, the climate, combined to make of it a place of residence so perfectly to her mind, that again and again in her letters she expresses her wish that she could bring over her children and there fix her abode.
Alluding to a performance of 'Semiramide, he said with a malicious smile, 'I suppose you saw the beautiful decorations in it? He has not received the Sisters Marchisio for fear they should sing to him, nor has he heard them in the theatre; he spoke warmly of Pasta, Lablache, Rubini, and others, then he added that I ought not to look with jealousy upon his budding talent as a pianoforte-player, but that, on the contrary, I should help to establish his reputation as such in Leipsic.
Here she enjoyed the advantage of studying the great lyric tragedienne, with whom she occasionally performed: not a look, a tone, a gesture of her great model escaped her. She was given the part of Jane Seymour in Donizetti's "Anna Bolena," which she looked and acted to perfection, Pasta personating the unfortunate Queen.
It is a charming relic, that custom of the brighter days of Italy; and I myself have listened, on the still waters of the same lake, to a similar greeting to a greater genius the queenlike and unrivalled Pasta the Semiramis of Song!
The opera had been originally written for Mme. Colbran, Rossini's wife, and when it was revived for Pasta that great lyric tragedienne had embodied in it a grand, stormy, passionate style, suited to the genre of her genius. Mme.
She played the harp, sang, and sketched with native art. At seventeen, on hearing Pasta sing in Paris, she sought out the artist and solicited lessons. Pasta, on hearing her sing, encouraged her, and recommended a teacher. She wrote novels, which, however, failed to make their mark.
We have now reached a period of Pasta's life where its chronicle becomes painful. It is never pleasant to watch the details of the decadence which comes to almost all art-careers. Her warmest admirers could not deny that Pasta was losing her voice. Her consummate art shone undimmed, but her vocal powers, especially in respect of intonation, displayed the signs of wear.
At the age of seventeen, she heard Pasta in Paris; flew up in a fire of youthful enthusiasm; and the next morning, all alone and without introduction, found her way into the presence of the PRIMA DONNA and begged for lessons. Pasta made her sing, kissed her when she had done, and though she refused to be her mistress, placed her in the hands of a friend. But Mrs.
You tell me that S never rivalled Pasta, but certainly her Norma is a great performance. Her voice has lost less of its freshness than I had been told, and what is lost of it her practised management conceals or carries off.
This opera has been compared by critics to Shakespeare's "King Lear," as being a great expression of anguish and despair in their more stormy phases. Chorley tells us that, when he first saw it, he was irresistibly reminded of the lines in Barry Cornwall's poem to Pasta: "Now thou art like some winged thing that cries Above some city, flaming fast to death."
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