Francesca Cuzzoni - Cuzzoni As An Artist

Cuzzoni As An Artist

Clearly, in her prime, Cuzzoni was a singer and artist of the first class. The well-known writer on singing, Giovanni Battista Mancini, gave a glowing testament to her art:

"It is difficult to decide whether she excels more in slow or in rapid airs. A "native warble" enabled her to execute divisions with such facility as to conceal their difficulty. So grateful and touching was her natural tone that she rendered pathetic whatever she sang, when she had the opportunity to unfold the whole volume of her voice. Her power of conducting, sustaining, increasing, and diminishing her notes by minute degrees acquired for her the credit of being a complete mistress of her art. Her trill was perfect: she had a creative fancy, and a command of tempo rubato. Her high notes were unrivaled in clearness and sweetness, and her intonation was so absolutely true that she seemed incapable of singing out of tune. She had a compass of two octaves, C to C in alt. Her style was unaffected, simple, and sympathetic."

Quantz wrote that "her style of singing was innocent and affecting" and that her ornaments "took possession of the soul of every auditor, by her tender and touching expression".