(b Perugia, 9 Dec 1610; d Perugia, 18 Nov 1680). Italian soprano castrato. He sang at Orvieto Cathedral (1623–4) before going to Rome to study with Vincenzo Ugolini of Perugia, maestro of the Cappella Giulia. In 1625 Prince (later King) Władisław IV of Poland heard him sing in Rome and took him to the Warsaw court, where he took part in performances of drammi per musica. He was in Perugia between 1637 and 1639, when he sang sacred works by G.F. Marcorelli, and again in 1651. In 1643 he was honoured for his singing in Venice, by being made a Knight of St Mark and in 1654 he visited Stockholm. Leaving Poland in 1655, Ferri went to Vienna, to the court of Ferdinand III and of his successor Leopold I, who heaped honours on him; in a portrait of the time he is called ‘Baldassarre of Perugia, King of Musicians’. In March 1664 he performed in an oratorio in Perugia together with G.A. Angelini, and in Holy Week of the same year he sang in S Apollinare, Rome, in the presence of Queen Christina of Sweden. He was in London in 1669–70. In 1675 (or 1680) he retired to Perugia where he worked principally at the church of S Filippo Neri. He was praised by his contemporaries, as the ‘Phoenix of Swans and of Singers’, for his vocal gifts and outstanding musical intelligence.
Il pianto de’ cigni, in morte della Fenice de’ musici, il cav. Baldassarre Ferri (Perugia, 1680)
G. Conestabile: Notizie biografiche di Baldassarre Ferri, musico celebratissimo (Perugia, 1846)
A. Lupattelli: ‘Baldassarre Ferri’, Perugia ed i suoi uomini illustri (Perugia, 1882, 3/1890), 82–4
G. Monaldi: Cantanti evirati celebri del teatro italiano (Rome, 1920)
K. Targosz-Kretowa: ‘Le théâtre d’opéra à la cour de Ladislas IV, roi de Pologne (1635–1648)’, Revue d’histoire du théâtre, xix (1967), 33–56
M. Baiocco: Su Baldassarre Ferri, cantante evirato del Seicento (diss., U. of Perugia, 1992–3)
GALLIANO CILIBERTI