About the work
Rappresentatione di Anima, et di Corpo is a sacred opera by Emilio de' Cavalieri to a libretto by Agostino Manni, first performed in February 1600 at the Oratorio dei Filippini by the Chiesa Nuova (Santa Maria in Vallicella) in Rome. Its score was published in September 1600 — three months before Giulio Caccini's Euridice — and was the first printed music to use a figured bass.
Plot
In allegorical form, Soul (Anima) and Body (Corpo) debate how to live rightly in the face of mortality, joined by figures such as Time, Pleasure, Intellect and the World itself, until the Soul finally chooses the spiritual path. The plot follows a Baroque morality-play pattern related to the Everyman tradition, carried throughout by music rather than spoken text.
Cultural significance
Because it tells its story continuously through music via "recitar cantando" — accompanied, speech-like solo singing — Cavalieri planned a staged performance from the outset rather than a purely devotional service. The work is therefore regarded as the earliest fully surviving opera and, at the same time, a founding text of the oratorio.