The chilling truth behind the heavenly voice of the 'Angel of Rome': Ethereal song of the only castrato ever recorded goes viral as people learn about the Catholic Church's horrendous role in mutilating boys

Daily Mail​

3 days ago

For centuries, their voices soared in gilded churches and candlelit concert halls - otherworldly, pure and achingly beautiful.
But behind the ethereal sound of the castrato singers lay an unspeakable truth. To preserve the high, angelic tone of boyhood, thousands of young boys were castrated.
After women were forbidden by the Pope from singing in sacred spaces, boys with exceptional vocal talent were mutilated before puberty, preventing their voices from breaking and allowing them to sing soprano with the lung power of grown men.
Now, a viral video shared by opera singer and vocal coach Eva Lindqvist, known as @evateachingopera on Instagram, has pulled back the curtain on this chilling chapter in musical history.
In the video, Eva plays a rare and eerie recording.
'This is the voice of Alessandro Moreschi, the last known castrato singer and the only whose singing was ever recorded,' she tells her followers.
'His voice sounds fragile, and almost ghostly, right? What I have to say is he wasn't young anymore when these recordings were produced.'
Moreschi was castrated around the age of seven for so-called 'medical reasons' - a common euphemism at the time.
He would go on to join the Pope's personal choir at the Sistine Chapel, earning the nickname 'The Angel of Rome.'
The recordings, made in 1902 and 1904, capture a voice that is equal parts ethereal and unsettling - a glimpse of a practice long buried by history.
'Why were boys with beautiful voices castrated from the 16th-19th century?' Eva asks in the video.
'To preserve their angelic tone. The result was the power of a man with the range of a boy.
'The practice began in the 16th century, mainly for church music when women were banned from singing in sacred places, and it only ended in the late 19th century - can you believe that?'
The Catholic Church's role in the proliferation of castrato singers has remained controversial, with calls for an official apology for the mutilations carried out under its watch.
As early as 1748, Pope Benedict XIV attempted to ban the practice, but it was so entrenched, and so popular with audiences, that he eventually relented, fearing it would cause church attendance to drop.
While Moreschi remains the only castrato whose solo voice was ever recorded, others like Domenico Salvatori, who sang alongside him, also made ensemble recordings - none of which have survived as solo performances.
Moreschi officially retired in 1913 and died in 1922, marking the true end of the era.
Eva's video, which has now racked up thousands of views and stirred a wave of emotional reactions, concludes with a poignant message.
'Alessandro Moreschi's voice is a haunting reminder of a time when boys were altered for art - praised for their voices, but silenced in so many other ways,' she wrote in the caption.
'His story isn't just vocal history - it's a glimpse into beauty, sacrifice and a world we can't imagine today.'
Castration, often carried out between the ages of 8 and 10, was performed under grim conditions.
Some boys were placed in ice or milk baths, given opium to induce a coma and then subjected to techniques such as twisting the testicles until they atrophied or, in rare cases, complete surgical removal.
Many didn't survive the procedure - either from accidental opium overdose, or from being rendered unconscious by prolonged compression of the carotid artery.
Where the procedures were carried out remained a closely guarded secret.
Italian society, even then, was deeply ashamed.
The act was technically illegal across all provinces, and yet boys continued to disappear into the folds of choir schools, never to reach physical manhood.
The physical effects on those who survived were dramatic.
The absence of testosterone meant that bone joints didn't harden, resulting in elongated limbs and ribs.
This unique anatomy, combined with rigorous training, gave the castrati immense lung capacity and vocal flexibility, allowing them to sing with supernatural agility and power unmatched by male or female voices today.
Despite their cultural cachet, castrati were rarely referred to by that name.
More polite, yet often derisive, terms like musico or evirato (emasculated) were used.
In public, they were celebrated and in private, they were pitied.
Rumours have long circulated that the Vatican harboured castrato singers until the 1950s.
While false, these stories hint at the mystique surrounding Moreschi's successors.
One singer, Domenico Mancini, was so adept at mimicking Moreschi that even Vatican officials believed he was a true castrato.
In reality, he was simply a falsettist - an uncastrated singer trained to imitate the distinctive sound.
But it is Moreschi's voice that endures as a spectral echo of a vanished world.
As Eva Lindqvist says: 'The Angel of Rome died in April 1922 - the voice of a lost world.'
Among the most legendary castrato singers were Giovanni Battista Velluti and Giusto Fernando Tenducci - two flamboyant, fascinating figures whose lives read like a Regency-era soap opera.
The last of the greats: Giovanni Battista Velluti
Giovanni Battista Velluti, often referred to simply as 'Giambattista', was born in 1780 in Pausula, Italy, and is widely recognised as the last great castrato.
But his rise to fame began in shocking circumstances.
At just eight years old, Velluti was castrated by a local doctor, supposedly as a treatment for a cough and high fever.
Despite his father's plans for him to join the military, his new physical condition meant he was instead enrolled in music training - a decision that would ultimately change his life and the opera world forever.
Velluti quickly gained attention for his extraordinary voice and dramatic presence.
He even became close with a future Pope, Luigi Cardinal Chiaramonte, who would later become Pope Pius VII, after performing a cantata during his teenage years.
He became so renowned that major composers began writing roles specifically for him.
Velluti made his London debut in 1825. Although he was the first castrato to perform in London in 25 years, and was initially met with scepticism, the curiosity and spectacle of his voice drew huge crowds.
He went on to manage The King's Theatre in 1826, starring in Aureliano In Palmira and Tebaldo Ed Isolina by Morlacchi.
But his theatrical reign wasn't without drama. His diva-like behaviour led to tensions backstage, with reports that some singers refused to share the stage with him.
His stint as theatre manager ended following disputes over chorus pay - a financial spat that brought his behind-the-scenes ambitions to a halt.
Velluti made one final return to London in 1829, though only for concert performances.
After retiring from music, he lived a quieter life as an agriculturist, passing away in 1861 at the age of 80.
His death marked the end of an era - he was the last great operatic castrato.
The scandalous soprano: Giusto Fernando Tenducci
If Velluti was the final chapter of the castrato phenomenon, Giusto Fernando Tenducci was one of its most flamboyant and scandalous stars.
Born around 1735 in Siena, Tenducci trained at the Naples Conservatory after undergoing castration as a boy.
He first rose to fame in Italy but soon found his true stage in the UK, where his career and personal life took several unexpected turns.
He arrived in London in 1758 and began performing at the prestigious King's Theatre.
Tenducci also found himself in financial trouble, spending eight months in a debtors' prison, but it didn't dampen his career.
By 1764, he was back at the King's Theatre, starring in a new opera in which he sang the title role opposite the star castrato Giovanni Manzuoli.
But it was his private life that truly stunned society.
In 1766, Tenducci secretly married a 15-year-old Irish heiress named Dorothea Maunsell.
The marriage was repeated the following year with a formal licence, despite the glaring issue that he was a castrato.
Unsurprisingly, the marriage caused a scandal. In 1772, it was annulled on the grounds of non-consummation or impotence, one of the very few legal grounds on which a woman could successfully sue for divorce at the time.
Notorious libertine Giacomo Casanova claimed in his autobiography that Dorothea had given birth to two children with Tenducci.
But modern biographer Helen Berry, while digging into the case, couldn't verify the claim, and suggested the children may have belonged to Dorothea's second husband.
Still, the speculation endures, as does Tenducci's status as one of the most controversial castrati to grace the stage.
A close friend of Moreschi's: Domenico Salvatori
Domenico Salvatori was a star in his own right in the rarefied, gilded world of 19th-century sacred music.
It wasn't long before he made the leap to the even more prestigious Sistine Chapel Choir, where he transitioned to singing soprano or mezzo-soprano, depending on the repertoire.
There, he became an integral part of the choir's inner workings, eventually taking on the role of choir secretary, a trusted position.
Salvatori's devotion to the chapel and his music was matched by his friendships. He was especially close to Moreschi.
While Salvatori never recorded any solo material, he did lend his voice to a handful of early phonograph sessions - musical relics that remain among the few surviving audio records of the castrato sound.
Though the recordings were intended to showcase the Sistine Choir's choral sound rather than individual singers, careful listeners can still pick out Salvatori's unique tone.
Salvatori died in Rome on 11 December 1909. But even in death, his bond with Moreschi remained unbroken.
He was laid to rest in the Monumental Cimitero di Campo Verano - not just near, but in Moreschi's tomb, a quiet but deeply telling tribute to a lifelong friendship rooted in music, faith and their shared place in history as the final echoes of a vanishing vocal tradition.