Ottorino RESPIGHI (1879-1936)
Respighi
was an Italian composer who introduced Russian orchestral colour and some of the
violence of Richard Strauss’s harmonic techniques into Italian music. He
studied at the Liceo of Bologna and later with Rimsky-Korsakov in St.
Petersburg, where he was first violist in the Opera Orchestra. From his foreign
masters Respighi acquired a command of orchestral colour and an interest in
orchestral composition.
A
piano concerto by Respighi was performed at Bologna in 1902; a "notturno"
for orchestra was played at a concert in the Metropolitan Opera House that year.
His comic opera Re Enzo and the opera Semirama brought him
recognition and an appointment in 1913 to the Sta. Cecilia Academy in Rome as
professor of composition. He became director of the conservatory in 1924 but
resigned in 1926.
Respighi
was drawn to the sensual, decadent climate of the Rome depicted by the poet
D'Annunzio. In his celebrated suites, Pini di Roma (Pines of Rome) and Fontane
di Roma (Fountains of Rome) especially, he sought to convey the subtlety and
colour of the poet’s imagination. Other suites include Vetrate di chiesa
(Church Windows); Gli ucelli (The Birds); Feste Romane (Roman
Festival); and Trittico Botticelliano (Botticelli Triptych).
Respighi
was also drawn to old Italian music, which he arranged in two sets of Antique
Dances and Arias (transcribed for orchestra from lute pieces). One of his most
popular scores was his arrangement of pieces by Rossini, La Boutique
fantasque. As a composer of opera,