Leonora Baroni was an Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 singer, theorbist

Theorbo

A theorbo is a plucked string instrument. As a name, theorbo signifies a number of long-necked lutes with second pegboxes, such as the liuto attiorbato, the French théorbe des pièces, the English theorbo, the archlute, the German baroque lute, the angélique or angelica. The etymology of the name...

, lute

Lute

Lute can refer generally to any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back, or more specifically to an instrument from the family of European lutes....

nist, viol

Viol

The viol is any one of a family of bowed, fretted and stringed musical instruments developed in the mid-late 15th century and used primarily in the Renaissance and Baroque periods. The family is related to and descends primarily from the Renaissance vihuela, a plucked instrument that preceded the...

 player, and composer. She was the daughter of Adriana Basile

Adriana Basile

Adriana Basile was an Italian composer and singer, born in Posillipo, and died in Rome. From 1610 she worked for the Gonzagas in Mantua. Members of her family also worked for the court, including her brothers, Giambattista Basile, a poet, Lelio Basile, a composer, and her sisters, Margherita and...

, a virtuosa singer, and Mutio Baroni. Leonora Baroni was born at the Gonzaga

House of Gonzaga

The Gonzaga family ruled Mantua in Northern Italy from 1328 to 1708.-History:In 1433, Gianfrancesco I assumed the title of Marquis of Mantua, and in 1530 Federico II received the title of Duke of Mantua. In 1531, the family acquired the Duchy of Monferrato through marriage...

 court in Mantua

Mantua

Mantua is a city and comune in Lombardy, Italy and capital of the province of the same name. Mantua's historic power and influence under the Gonzaga family, made it one of the main artistic, cultural and notably musical hubs of Northern Italy and the country as a whole...

. She sang alongside her mother and sister Caterina at court and across Italy, including Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

, Genoa

Genoa

Genoa |Ligurian]] Zena ; Latin and, archaically, English Genua) is a city and an important seaport in northern Italy, the capital of the Province of Genoa and of the region of Liguria....

, and Florence

Florence

Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....

. She was admired not only for her skill as a musician, in which she almost overshadowed her mother, but also for her learning and refined manners. Baroni was honored by poets such as Fulvio Testi

Fulvio Testi

Fulvio Testi was an Italian diplomat and poet. Recognised as one of the main exponents of 17th century Baroque literature, he worked in the service of the d'Este dukes in Modena, for whom he held high office, such as the governorship of Garfagnana...

 and Francesco Bracciolini

Francesco Bracciolini

Francesco Bracciolini was an Italian poet.He was born of a noble family in Pistoia in 1566. On his removing to Florence he was admitted into the academy there, and devoted himself to literature. At Rome he entered the service of Cardinal Maffeo Barberini, with whom he afterwards went to France...

, who addressed poems to her, as did some nobles, such as Annibale Bentivoglio

Annibale Bentivoglio

Annibale Bentivoglio may refer to two different members of the Bentivoglio family:*Annibale I Bentivoglio, killed in 1445*Annibale II Bentivoglio , lord of Bologna in 1511-1512...

 and then-cardinal Pope Clement IX

Pope Clement IX

Pope Clement IX , born Giulio Rospigliosi, was Pope from 1667 to 1669.-Early life:Born Giulio Rospigliosi to a noble family of Pistoia, Grand Duchy of Tuscany, he was a pupil of the Jesuits. After receiving his doctorate in philosophy at the University of Pisa, he taught theology there...

. These poems were collected and published as Applausi poetici alle glorie della Signora Leonora Baroni in 1639 and reprinted in 1641. John Milton

John Milton

John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...

 later wrote a series of epigram

Epigram

An epigram is a brief, interesting, usually memorable and sometimes surprising statement. Derived from the epigramma "inscription" from ἐπιγράφειν epigraphein "to write on inscribe", this literary device has been employed for over two millennia....

s to her, entitled Ad Leonoram Romae canentem.

In 1633, Baroni moved with her mother to Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

, where she sang at many salons

Salon (gathering)

A salon is a gathering of people under the roof of an inspiring host, held partly to amuse one another and partly to refine taste and increase their knowledge of the participants through conversation. These gatherings often consciously followed Horace's definition of the aims of poetry, "either to...

 in the Palazzo Barberini

Palazzo Barberini

Palazzo Barberini is a palace in Rome, facing the piazza of the same name in Rione Trevi and is home to the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica.-History:...

. On 27 May 1640 Baroni married Giulio Cesare Castellani, Cardinal Francesco Barberini's

Francesco Barberini (seniore)

Francesco Barberini was an Italian Catholic Cardinal. The nephew of Pope Urban VIII , he benefited immensely from the nepotism practiced by his uncle...

 personal secretary.

In February 1644, Baroni moved to the French court of Anne of Austria

Anne of Austria

Anne of Austria was Queen consort of France and Navarre, regent for her son, Louis XIV of France, and a Spanish Infanta by birth...

 briefly, but by April of 1645 she was back in Rome, where she was a chamber

Chamber music

Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...

 singer. Apparently she was not admired in Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, perhaps because her Italian style of ornamented singing was too foreign to the court there.

None of Baroni's compositions survive, but the French traveller and viol player André Maugars

André Maugars

André Maugars was a French viol player. Marin Mersenne and Nicolas Hotman described him as the first French viol virtuoso, in particular, improviser of diminutions....

mentioned her compositions while praising the musical understanding of her singing.