Francesca Caccini (1587-after 1641) was a Florentine composer and singer who was employed by the Medici family from 1600-1627 and 1634-1641. Composers at the Medici court often worked collaboratively, and Caccini frequently collaborated with her colleagues Jacopo Peri and Marco da Gagliano. Although she wrote prolifically in the genres of monody, incidental entertainments, and theatrical works, many of her compositions do not survive. Caccini’s Il primo libro delle musiche (1618) is a compendium of 36 vocal solos and duets with continuo. The pieces exhibit a variety of stylist characteristics popular at the time–harmonically adventurous laments, exuberant sacred songs, and cheerful strophic love songs. Caccini uses her own poetry for most of the songs.
Caccini is widely regarded as the first woman to compose a staged musical-dramatic work, La liberazione di Ruggiero dall’isola d’Alcina. The work, which features a feminist libretto by Ferdinando Saracinelli, was performed when Prince Władisław of Poland visited Florence in 1625. Contemporary listeners praised the beauty of the siren song, the chorus of enchanted plants, the recorder trio, and the ensemble writing for women. Throughout the work, Caccini used tonal centers to indicate gender, with Alcina and her female attendants singing in flat keys, and Ruggiero and other male characters singing in sharp keys. The androgynous sorceress Melissa primarily sings in C Major. As Suzanne Cusick notes, “Women and men are portrayed as experiencing the action from different points of view, while juxtapositions of gender-identified key areas are frequent and striking enough to create a musical subtext exploring the relationship between social status and cross-gender behaviour.” The Polish prince was so taken by Caccini’s work that he commissioned two further music-dramatic pieces from her, neither of which is extant.
In addition to composing, Caccini had numerous performing and teaching responsibilities during her tenure at the Medici court. Her work was championed by Christine de Lorraine and Maria Maddelena of Austria, and as such, she was a key figure in teaching music to the young women at the gynocentric court. Caccini came from an established Florentine musical family– her father Giulio was a pioneering figure in the seconda practica compositional style, and he was responsible for establishing and training a group of Florentine women to sing at court to compete with the similar ensemble in Ferrara. Francesca’s mother Lucia was one of these singers, as was Giulio’s second wife Margherita and their children Settimia and Pompeo. Francesca made her performing debut in her family consort as a child, and her father’s court position provided her opportunities to demonstrate her skills to the Medici family. From 1622-1627, she was the highest paid musician at the Medici court.
Resources
Sources
Cusick, Suzanne G. Francesca Caccini at the Medici Court: Music and the Circulation of Power. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009.
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