- Performer Name:
- Rossetti; Giacomo Ferretti
- Performance Venue:
- Naples
- Performance Date:
- Author:
- Owenson, Sydney [Lady Morgan]
- Date Written:
- Language:
- English
- Publication Title:
- Italy
- Article Title:
- Naples
- Page Numbers:
- 3:281
- Additional Info:
- Publisher:
- Colburn
- Place of Publication:
- London
- Date Published:
- 1824
Text:
[Footnote:]
Rosetti is one of the best, and certainly one of the most amusing improvisatori in Italy. He assured us, that having once uttered his inspirations, he could not write them down, nor even remember a word; he is also a very good poet. Next to Rosetti, one of the gayest, and most entertaining improvisatori that we heard in Italy, was Signore Giacomo Ferretti of Rome. One night, at a party at the Baroness de B.'s, an Hanoverian lady of distinguished acquirements, some of the company having quizzed my passion for pulchinello and puppet-shows, which I constantly attended, Ferretti took it as a subject for an improviso, and not only treated it with infinite comic humour, but gave a very rapid and learned précis of the "Sette Maschere Italiane," "The seven Masques of Italy." He did not pause for a moment, and sang to an accompaniment on the piano-forte.
Notes:
- Collected by:
- DP