However pleased the directors may have been at first to have two popular
songstresses, they were soon dismayed at the fierce rivalry that sprang
up between them and was fanned to flames by Master Handel himself, who
now composed exclusively for Faustina. By increasing the salary of her
more tractable rival they finally disposed of Cuzzoni, who thenceforth
through her exaggerated demands, managed to disgust her patrons wherever
she appeared. Her reckless extravagance left her wholly destitute after
losing her voice and her husband, Signor Sandoni, a harpsichord-maker.
She passed her last years in Bologna, subsisting on a miserable pittance
earned by covering buttons.
Faustina married Adolphe Hasse, the German dramatic composer, and at
forty-seven sang before Frederick the Great, who was charmed with the
freshness of her voice. The couple lived until 1783, the one
eighty-three, the other eighty-four years of age. Dr. Burney visited
them when they were advanced in the seventies and found Faustina a
sprightly, sensible old lady, with a delightful store of reminiscences,
and her husband a communicative, rational old gentleman, quite free from
"pedantry, pride and prejudice.
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