ARC Discovery Project DP22

The term bel canto—beautiful singing—commonly describes the admired vocal practices (originating in Italy) that were prevalent in Europe during the period 1700–1900. But how did singing actually sound in this period? And what expressive practices did singers use to transform scores into passionate musical declamation—the fundamental aim of bel canto? These and other considerations are the subject of a new and exciting 3-year Discovery Project The shock of the old: Rediscovering the sounds of bel canto 1700–1900 funded by the Australian Research Council. The project will bring together an international community of singer practitioners guided by a stellar research team of performers and scholars, who will engage with practice-led methodologies to produce sound exemplars of singing as described in historical written descriptors.

Sound recordings of 19^th-century trained singers, for example the soprano Adelina Patti (1843–1919), the bass Peter Schram (1819–1895), and baritone Jean-Baptiste Faure (1830–1914), evidence singing styles belonging to a long-established continuum of practice, which were comprehensively abandoned during the early 20^th-century modernist revolution. Since that time, the term bel canto has been re-appropriated to describe modern singing practices far removed from original bel canto ideals. In this project, singers and instrumentalists will rediscover the sounds of bel canto through an innovative methodology. They will imitate and embody early recordings of singers to develop a pre-modern aesthetic (stage 1), before extrapolating backwards in time using tried and tested cyclical research methods and collaborative active experimentation (stage 2), to investigate bel canto sounds and practices across vocal genres.

The research team consists of world leaders in bel canto, historically informed performance, practice-led methods, and music science from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, The University of Sydney (Australia), Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University (Australia), Western University (Ontario, Canada), and the University of Music and Performing Arts (Vienna, Austria). We invite professional and semi-professional singer and instrumentalist practitioners (and other interested musicians) to join this ground-breaking project conducted via Zoom and in person (when possible), to establish an international singing community that will foster and influence change in classical singing.