1544, Casole D’Elsa, near Siena - fl Vicenza, 1566–83 - ?

Italian composer, lutenist and singer.
The name seems to indicate an origin in Casole d’Elsa; Giulio Piccolomini claimed her for Siena, but knew little about her. There is no evidence to tie her to any place except Vicenza: as early as 1569 she was described as ‘Vicentina’.
Her three books of madrigals are the first by a woman to be printed.
They contain 66 madrigals, of which five had already appeared in anthologies; one more madrigal is found only in an anthology.
Her Primo libro de madrigali a quattro voci (Venice, 1568) was dedicated to Isabella de’ Medici Orsini (a noted patron and musical amateur).
This spirited manifesto shows Casulana to be a woman of self-assurance.
She was already a wellknown composer and had set an epithalamium, Nil mage iucundum, in five parts for a royal wedding in Munich (where she travelled at the duke’s expense) earlier in 1568.
Also in that year Antonio Molino, the Venetian merchant, actor and writer, dedicated to Casulana his Dilettevoli madrigali, saying they had been written after studying music with her.
The book includes settings of three poems written in Casulana’s praise. Giambattista Maganza dedicated a canzone in dialect to  her in 1569.
In May 1570 Casulana dedicated her Secondo libro de’ madrigali a quattro voci to Don Antonio Londonio, a Milanese official and notable patron of music whose wife, Isabella, was a well-known singer.
Her activities for the next twelve years are unknown.  Giambattista Crispolti described a 1582 banquet in Perugia after which ‘La Casolana famosa … cantò al liuto di musica divinamente’.
In August 1582 the publisher Angelo Gardano dedicated to ‘la Signora Madalena Casulana di Mezarii’ his edition of Monte’s Primo libro de madrigali a tre voci, imploring Casulana to favour him with some compositions in this now neglected genre. One three-part madrigal by her was published in 1586.
‘Di Mezarii’, probably her married name, appears in a variant form on the title-page of her last surviving publication, Di Madalena Mezari detta Casulana Vicentina, Il primo libro de madrigali a cinque voci, dedicated to Mario Bevilacqua, patron of the Accademia Filarmonia of Verona, at which Casulana evidently performed during a visit to the city.
On 18 January 1583, Casulana performed at a meeting of the Accademia Olimpica in Vicenza;  at one time the Accademia owned a portrait of her.
Casulana’s madrigals show skill and originality in the handling of harmony and dissonance.
She used chromatic alteration and unexpected harmonic juxtapositions daringly and experimented with dramatic contrasts of register and passages in falsobordone style.
In her poetic choices she favoured contemporary lyric verse, which she illustrated with an arsenal of word-painting devices.
She was less strong in the areas of melodic and rhythmic invention, and her part-writing is often flawed.
But these weaknesses are offset by stunning and original effects, and her madrigals have an unusually personal and distinctive style.

Bibliography:

A. Einstein: The Italian Madrigal (Princeton, NJ, 1949/R)
J. Fétis: Biographie universelle des musiciens
O. Mischiati: Indici, cataloghi e avvisi degli editori e librai musicali italiani (Florence, 1984)
A. Newcomb: The Madrigal at Ferrara, 1579-1597 (Princeton, NJ, 1980)
La terza parte de le rime di Magnanò, Menon e Begotto (Venice, 1569)
M. Troiano: Dialoghi (Venice, 1569)
G. Piccolomini: Siena Illustre per antichità
A. Borsetti: Supplemento al compendio historico del Signor D. Marc’Antonio Guarini Ferrarese (Ferrara, 1670)
A. Fabretti, ed.: Cronache della città di Perugia, IV (Turin, 1892)
B. Pescerelli: I madrigali di Maddalena Casulana (Florence, 1979)
J. Bowers: ‘The Emergence of Women Composers in Italy, 1566–1700’, Women Making Music: the Western Art Tradition, 1150–1950, ed. J. Bowers and J. Tick (Urbana, 1986)
P.E. Carapezza: ‘Musiche e muse: Compositrici nel Rinascimento’, Musica senza aggettivi: studi per Fedele d’Amico, ed. A. Ziino (Florence, 1991)
Grove Music Online: www.oxfordmusiconline.com

Author:

Thomas W. Bridges

Works:

Madrigals edited in Pescerelli
Il primo libro de madrigali, 4 voices (Venice, 1568)
Il secondo libro de madrigali, 4 voices (Venice, 1570)
Il primo libro de madrigali, 5 voices (Venice, 1583)
Madrigal, 3 voices
Wedding piece: 5 voices, perf. Munich, 1568, music lost
Madrigali Spirituali, 2 books, 4 voices (Venice, ?Vincenti), lost; cited in Mischiati