YEARBOOK OF THE ALAMIRE FOUNDATION

142 DONNA G. CARDAMONE JACKSON
The texts of villanelle given to Lasso are all characterized by rhetorical tendencies
to amplification and metaphor, a kind of discourse that invites the expressive hand
gestures traditionally associated with Neapolitans. 33 That Lasso was capable of creating
poems calling for semantic completion through visible bodily action is implied
in a letter he wrote to Wilhelm of Bavaria in 1574, describing how he entertained his
companions on a journey to Italy: ‘I have been reciting jokes, proverbs, and strambotti
with lots of farcical and bawdy humor’. 34 Clearly by this time he had built up
the same stock of gestural materials that villanella poets habitually exploited for comical
effects. Lasso’s predilection for ribald gestic humor finds a parallel in no. 15,
wherein sexually suggestive descriptions of playing instruments are juxtaposed with
droll punning on solmization syllables that signify love-making. 35
No. 18 is a pertinent example of how Lasso might load his memory with matter
relevant to his favorite dell’arte character – a lascivious old man baffled and frustrated
by women (see Example 5). Here the speaker identifies himself as Pasquarello,
an emerging vecchio mask of Neapolitan origin, 36 whose stage personality was similar
to that of Pantalone, the senile Venetian merchant that Lasso portrayed in a comedy
staged in 1568 for the Bavarian court. Pasquarello’s language is inherently theatrical
and obviously contrived to be completed by correlative gestures, both mimetic and
musical. At the beginning of each stanza he greets an attractive signora with a rhythmically
animated tune that rises sequentially, then slows as it sinks to the cadence.
The shaping of the phrase allows the singer to express with his face or hands the
desire that devours Pasquarello and even to bow down in an exaggerated manner –
assuming that the villanella was rendered soloistically with lute accompaniment, a
common practice. The tune reaches its highest peak in the recurrent refrain and then
descends in urgent leaps as Pasquarello begs in vain for the signora’s hand, again
suggesting performative gestures. It is not clear if the signora is a lady of doubtful
reputation or an aristocrat obliged to maintain a haughty demeanor. Nonetheless, her
silent disdain invites the singer to put his hands, head, and eyes into motion to amplify
Pasquarello’s frustrated desire for the audience.
Emerging dell’arte masks were introduced to Rome at mid-century by itinerant comedians
from the Veneto, offering Lasso the opportunity to observe the antics of Pantalone
and his servant Zanni, also known for singing canzoni to lute accompaniment. 37
33 A. DE JORIO, Gesture in Naples and Gesture in Classical Antiquity, trans. A. KENDON, Bloomington,
2000.
34 Quoted in P. WELLER, Lasso, Man of the Theatre, in I. BOSSUYT, E. SCHREURS and A. WOUTERS
eds., Orlandus Lassus and His Time, (Yearbook of the Alamire Foundation, 1), Peer, 1995, p. 90.
35 For an edition of this villanella, see CARDAMONE, The Salon as Marketplace, pp. 72–74. It proved
to be the most popular villanella in Dorico’s anthology, having been arranged by six composers (see
Table 2).
36 A. NICOLL, Masks Mimes and Miracles. Studies in the Popular Theatre, New York, 1963, p. 260.
37 F. CRUCIANI, Teatro nel rinascimento. Roma 1450–1550, Rome, 1983, pp. 623–627.