Caterina Gabrielli, born Caterina Fatta, was an Italian coloratura singer. She was the most important soprano of her age. A woman of great personal charm and dynamism, Charles Burney referred to her as "the most intelligent and best-bred virtuosa" that he had ever encountered. The excellence of her vocal artistry is reflected in the fact that she was able to secure long-term engagements in three of the most prestigious operatic centers in her day outside of Italy.
Biography
Caterina Gabrielli was the daughter of a cook in the service of prince Gabrielli, in Rome. With the support of the prince, she studied with García and Porpora and at the L'Ospedaletto conservatory in Venice, and as a sign of gratitude she decided to assume her patron's surname as her stage name. Her humble roots were remembered by audiences in her nickname La cochetta, which was actually recorded in the librettos published for her early appearances at the Teatro San Moisè in Venice during the 1754–55 operatic season. In 1747 she sang at the theater of Lucca in Sofonisba by Baldassare Galuppi and in 1750 she appeared in Niccolò Jommelli's Didone. Her first distinguished season of singing was in Venice in 1754–55. She was then hired by the imperial court of Vienna and sang in a series of dramatic works of various types written by Christoph Willibald von Gluck: La danza, Le cinesi, L'innocenza giustificata, and Il re pastore. She also appeared in two sacred works of Georg Christoph Wagenseil: Gioas re ti Giuda and Il roveto di Mosè. She flourished in Italy for the remainder of the 1750s, notably appearing in the world premieres of Pasquale Errichelli's Siroe and Gaetano Latilla's Ezio. In 1760 Gabrielli returned to Vienna to appears in Gluck's Tetide, Giuseppe Scarlatti's Issipile, and Johann Adolf Hasse's Alciade al Bivio. A second return to Italy brought even greater prestige. In 1767, she created the role of Argene in Josef Mysliveček's opera Il Bellerofonte at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, thereby helping the composer break through to the upper echelon of operatic masters in Italy. In the period 1772–75, she was employed at the imperial court of St. Petersburg with Francesca Gabrielli. She appeared in Tommaso Traetta's operas Antigona, Amore e Psiche and Lucio Vero. She also sang several aria concerts with orchestral accompaniment at the court. In 1775 she moved to London because the director of imperial theaters in St. Petersburg was unwilling to pay what her future employers in London had promised. During her last period of activity in Italy, in the title role of Mysliveček's Armida, performed in Milan during carnival of 1780 as one of the earliest operas produced at La Scala, she was forced to interrupt her performances in order to give birth to a baby daughter, the identity of whose father remains unknown. She also suffered the indignities of having to substitute arias by Giuseppe Sarti for the ones provided for her by Mysliveček and being taunted for her age by the Milanese audience. Although Gabrielli and Mysliveček were close artistic collaborators at times, there is no documentation to support reports that they were romantically involved; the earliest mention of a love affair with Mysliveček is found in the fifth edition of the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. She was actually closer to the composer Traetta, who was probably responsible for having her brought to St. Petersburg. After her last known operatic appearances in Venice in 1782, she retired to Bologna, where she died in 1796. The singer Francesca Gabrielli was probably her sister. She frequently traveled with Caterina and sometimes appeared in lesser roles in the same operas that featured her as prima donna.
