"Signora Antonini" in La Clemenza di Tito

[dennis]

It is time to take out your favorite reference books on Mozart’s operas and make a correction/addition.

Most all commentators of Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito have identified the singer of the part of Servilia as an unknown female singer. In the June 1999 (vol 47, part 1-2) issue of the Mitteilungen der Internationalen Stiftung Mozarteum Walther Brauneis took this identification up in an article titled: ‘Wer war Mozarts "Sig[no]ra Antonini" in der Prager Uraufführung von La Clemenza di Tito? ‘

Mozart had only carried the name "Sigra Antonini" in his work catalogue with the other performers for Tito. “Sigra Antonini” sang the role of Servilla in Mozart’s opera. All commentators up to Brauneis had believed this singer's last name was Antonini. The impressario of the performance of Tito, Domenico Guardasoni, had returned to Prague after almost two years in Warsaw with his acting troupe. On June 14, 1791 a notice in the Prager Stadttorschreibers listed the names of the performers in his troupe: "Hr. Bassi, Hr. Balleoni, Mad. Perini with three daughters, Mad. Katharina Mitschelli, Mad. Michalowitz, Hr. Bonziani, Hr. Campi, Hr. Lolli". A closer look shows that some of these names were phonetically spelled: "Balleoni" for Antonio Baglioni, "Mitschelli" for Catarina Micelli, and "Bonziani" for Felice Ponziani. Many of these performed in Mozart operas in Prague (including Tito). But there was no record of a Mad. Michalowitz in the Guardasoni ensemble.

This problem was solved by a listing in the 1793 "Theater-Kalender” of members of Guardasoni's Italian opera group. Listed here was a "Mad. Campy". This is the Soprano Antonia Campi, who had married the Bass singer Gaetano Campi on October 15, 1791--thus about a month after the premiere of Tito. Her maiden name was Antonina Miklaszewiczowna (the ending "owna", showing she was the daughter of Milaszewicz, was dropped). She gave her birthday as December 10, 1773, in Lublin. Guardasoni had became acquainted with her in Warsaw, where she had sang at the court of King Stanislaus August Poniatowski since 1788. Obviously the June 1791 Prague notice had phonetically spelled her last name, and she had Italianized her first name from Antonina to Antonini. Brauneis believed as Mozart always had a struggle with family names, he was no doubt hardly able to remember the maiden name of Antonia Campi, to say nothing of writing it down. Thus he only recorded her as "Sig Antonini" in his work catalogue.

By 1793 Antonini Campi had become a Prima donna in Guardasoni's troupe. She would triumph as the Countess in Le nozze di Figaro, and also Donna Anna in Don Giovanni. Her Queen of the Night must have been incomparable according to reports. She also participated in Mozart's widow’s musical concert of November 15, 1797.

When Emanuel Schikaneder opened his new Theater an der Wien in 1801, Antonini Campi was signed to a contract. On January 4, 1802, she sang the Queen of the Night there. According to reports she sang it “in the high key, in which Mozart originally wrote" and her staccato "sounded like bursting pearls". For this theater she also sang Donna Anna in Don Giovanni and Constanze in Entführung.

In 1806 at the Kärntnertortheater in Vienna she again sang in La Clemenza di Tito', but this time as Vitellia. She again sang Vitellia in 1811 at this theater in a German language version of the opera. From a letter of the Czech pianist Wenzel Johann Tomaschek we also know she sang in Don Giovanni in the Kärntnertheater in 1812. She retired from the court theater in 1818, but Mozart's son Franz Xavier heard her sing in Entführung and as the Queen of the Night in 1820 in Vienna.

In her marriage to Gaetano Campi, 17 children were born, including 4 sets of twins, and triplets on February 23, 1800. Antonia Campi died on October 1, 1822 in Munich.

Dennis Pajot