Les Grands Castrats napolitains a Venise au XVIII siecle.

Naples overtook Venice in the course of the eighteenth century as the chief fount of Italian music, in particular of Italian opera; that made it in the eyes of many (outside France) the leading creative centre in Europe. Accounts of the change tend to stress the role of the new Neapolitan composers in the galant style who came to dominate opera in the second quarter of the century - Vinci, Porpora, Pergolesi, Leo and Hasse in particular. Dr Mamy focuses instead on the role of castrato singers: first, a group brought to Venice by the Venetian cardinal and theatre owner Vincenzo Grimani when he was viceroy of Naples in the Austrian interest during the War of the Spanish Succession …