Caroline Carvalho and nineteenth-century coloratura

AbstractThis essay explores how the soprano Caroline Carvalho (néeMarie Félix-Miolan, 1827–95) perpetuated and extended the art of coloratura singing in the mid-nineteenth century. Creator of roles in sixteen operas, including five by Gounod, Carvalho achieved ‘superdiva’ status (Rutherford) by cultivating her voice – her ‘mécanisme prodigieux’ – to handle coloratura on a scale that explicitly invoked and rivalled the instrumental virtuosity of Paganini. In premièring the title role of Victor Massé'sLa Reine Topaze(1856), the soprano sang a variations aria based on the Carnival of Venice folk song and took one of the violinist's variations as a springboard to her own dazzling pyrotechnics. By allying her voice with the musical inventiveness of Paganini, who had achieved deific renown and artistic authority, Carvalho thereby acquired enough authority to catalyse a new genre, thevalse-ariette. The popularity of a little-known aria that Gounod arranged for Carvalho, ‘Ah! Valse légère’ (based on the waltz chorus, ‘Ainsi que la brise légère’, from Act II ofFaust, 1859), spurred a vogue for vertiginous waltz ariettes. Carvalho's association with this genre suggests even greater creative agency and indicates a shift in coloratura's signification from instrumentality to dance and the expressive body.