Rossini, Gioachino (1792-1868), Italy

Gioachino Rossini was born on February 29, 1792 in the city of Pesaro in the family of a city trumpeter and singer. Having received his primary education, the future composer began his working life as a blacksmith's apprentice. At an early age, Rossini moved to Bologna, then the center of provincial musical culture in Italy.

In Wagner there are charming moments and terrible quarters of an hour.

Rossini Gioacchino

In 1806, at the age of 14, he was elected a member of the Bologna Academy of Sciences and in the same year entered the music lyceum. At the Lyceum Rossini mastered professional knowledge. He was greatly influenced by the work of Haydn and Mozart. Particular success in his training was observed in the field of vocal writing technique - the culture of singing in Italy has always been at its best.

In 1810, Rossini, who graduated from the Lyceum, staged his first opera, “The Promissory Note for Marriage,” in Venice. A year after this performance, he became known throughout Italy and since then has devoted his work to musical theater.

Six years later, he composed “The Barber of Seville,” which brought him fame that eclipsed even Beethoven, Weber and other musical luminaries of that time in the eyes of his contemporaries.

Rossini was only thirty years old when his name became known throughout the world, and music became an integral part of the 19th century. On the other hand, until 1822, the composer lived continuously in his homeland, and of the 33 operas he wrote between 1810 and 1822, only one ended up in the world musical treasury.

Give me the laundry bill and I'll put it to music.

Rossini Gioacchino

At that time, the theater in Italy was not so much a center of art as a place of friendly and business meetings, and Rossini did not fight it. He brought a new breath to the culture of his country - the magnificent culture of bel canto, the cheerfulness of the folk song of Italy.

Particularly interesting were the composer's creative quests in the period between 1815 and 1820, when Rossini tried to introduce the achievements of advanced opera schools in other countries. This is noticeable in his works “The Virgin of the Lake” (1819) or “Othello” (after Shakespeare).

This period in Rossini's work was marked, first of all, by a number of major achievements in the field of comic theater. However, he needed to develop further. A major role in this was played by his direct acquaintance with the latest art of Austria, Germany and France. Rossini visited Vienna in 1822, and the result was the development of orchestral-symphonic principles in his subsequent operas, for example, in Semiriad (1823). Subsequently, Rossini continued his creative search in Paris, where he moved in 1824. Moreover, in six years he wrote five operas, two of which were reworkings of his previous works. In 1829, William Tell appeared, written for the French stage. It became both the peak and the end of Rossini's creative evolution. After its release, Rossini, at the age of 37, stopped creating for the stage. He wrote two more famous works, "Stabat Mater" (1842) and "Little Solemn Mass" (1863). It is not clear why, in the triumph of glory, the composer decided to leave the heights of musical Olympus, but it is indisputable that Rossini did not accept new directions in opera in the mid-19th century.

This kind of music needs to be listened to more than once or twice. But I can't do it more than once.

Rossini Gioacchino

In the last ten years of his life (1857-1868), Rossini became interested in piano music. From 1855 he lived constantly in Paris, where he died on November 13, 1868. In 1887 his ashes were transported to his homeland.

WORKS:

operas (38 in total):

"Promissory Note for Marriage" (1810)

"The Silk Staircase" (1812)

"Touchstone" (1812)

"Strange Case" (1812)

"Signor Bruschino" (1813)

"Tancred" (1813)

"Italian in Algiers" (1813)

"The Turk in Italy" (1814)

"Elizabeth, Queen of England" (1815)

"Torvaldo and Dorliska" (1815)

"The Barber of Seville" (1816)

"Othello" (1816)

"Cinderella" (1817)

"The Thieving Magpie" (1817)

“AT THE AGE OF 14, THE LIST OF “FORTRESSES” HE TOOK INCLUDED AS MANY WOMEN AS ARE ONLY EXPERIENCED LOCALISTS....”

"SUN OF ITALY"

Gioachino Rossini is a great Italian composer, creator of numerous operas and amazingly bright and beautiful melodies, a brilliant conversationalist and wit, a lover of life and a Don Juan, a gourmet and culinary specialist.

“Delightful”, “sweetest”, “captivating”, “comforting”, “sunny”... What epithets were awarded to Rossini by his contemporaries. The most enlightened people of different times and nations were under the spell of his music. Alexander Pushkin wrote in Eugene Onegin:

But the blue evening is getting dark,

It's time for us to go to the Opera quickly:

There is delightful Rossini,

Europe's darling - Orpheus.

Not heeding harsh criticism,

He is forever the same, forever new,

He pours sounds - they boil,

They flow, they burn,

Like young kisses

Everything is in bliss, in the flame of love,

Like boiling ai

Golden stream and splashes...

Honore de Balzac, after listening to Rossini’s “Moses,” said: “this music lifts bowed heads and inspires hope in the laziest hearts.” Through the mouth of his favorite hero Rastignac, the French writer says: “Yesterday the Italians showed Rossini’s The Barber of Seville. I have never heard such sweet music before. God! There are lucky people who have a box with the Italians.”

The German philosopher Hegel, having arrived in Vienna in September 1824, decided to attend one of the performances of the Italian Opera House. After listening to Rossini's Othello, he wrote to his wife: “As long as I have enough money to go to the Italian opera and pay for my return fare, I will stay in Vienna.” During his month of stay in the capital of Austria, the philosopher attended all the theater performances once, and the opera “Othello” 12 times (!).

Tchaikovsky, having listened to “The Barber of Seville” for the first time, wrote in his diary: ““The Barber of Seville” will forever remain an inimitable example... That unfeigned, selfless, irresistibly exciting gaiety with which every page of “The Barber” splashes, that brilliance and grace of melody and rhythm, with which this opera is full cannot be found in anyone.”

Heinrich Heine, one of the most fastidious and malicious people of his time, was completely disarmed by the music of the Italian genius: “Rossini, the divine maestro, is the sun of Italy, lavishing its sonorous rays on the whole world! I... admire your golden tones, the stars of your melodies, your sparkling butterfly dreams, so lovingly fluttering over me and kissing my heart with the lips of graces! Divine maestro, forgive my poor compatriots who do not see your depth - you covered it with roses..."

Stendhal, who witnessed the wild success of the Italian composer, stated: “Rossini’s fame can only be limited by the boundaries of the universe.”

WIGGING YOUR EARS IS ALSO A TALENT

A students are good performers, but C students rule the world. One day, an acquaintance told Rossini that a certain collector had collected a large collection of instruments of torture from all times and peoples. “Was there a piano in this collection?” - Rossini asked. “Of course not,” the interlocutor responded with surprise. “So he wasn’t taught music as a child!” - the composer sighed.

As a child, the future Italian celebrity did not show any hope for a bright future. Despite the fact that Rossini was born into a musical family, two undoubted talents that he was able to discover were the ability to move his ears and sleep in any environment. Unusually lively and expansive by nature, young Gioacchino avoided all kinds of study, preferring noisy games in the fresh air. His happiness was sleep, delicious food, good wine, the company of street daredevils and a variety of funny pranks, in which he was a real expert. He remained an illiterate person: his letters, always meaningful and witty, are full of monstrous grammatical errors. But is this a reason to be upset?

You don't know spelling well...

So much the worse for spelling!

His parents persistently tried to teach him the family profession - in vain: things did not move beyond scales. The parents decide: rather than see such a martyr’s face of Gioacchino every time the music teacher comes, it is better to send him to study with a blacksmith. He might like physical work more. Through a short time It turned out that the son of a trumpeter and opera singer also does not like blacksmithing. But, it seems, this little slob realized that it is much more pleasant and easier to tap the keys with a cymbal than to slam a heavy hammer on various pieces of iron. A pleasant transformation occurs with Gioacchino, it’s as if he woke up - he began to diligently study both school wisdom and, most importantly, music. And what’s even more surprising is that he unexpectedly discovered a new talent - a phenomenal memory.

At the age of 14, Rossini entered the Bologna Musical Lyceum, where he became the first student, and soon became equal to his teachers. A brilliant memory came in handy here too: he once recorded the music of an entire opera after listening to it only two or three times... Soon Rossini began conducting opera performances. Rossini's first creative experiments date back to this time - vocal numbers for a traveling troupe and the one-act comic opera "Bill of Marriage". His merits in the art of music were appreciated: at the age of 15, Rossini was already crowned with laurels from the Bologna Philharmonic Academy, thus becoming the youngest academician in Italy.

His good memory never failed him. Even in old age. There is a story about how once at one of the evenings, where, in addition to Rossini, Alfred Musset, a young French poet, was also present, the invitees took turns reading their poems and excerpts from his works. Musset read his new play to the public - about sixty poems. When he finished reading, there was applause.

“Your humble servant,” Musset bowed.

Sorry, but this can’t possibly be true: I learned these poems in school! And, by the way, I still remember!

With these words, the composer repeated word for word the verses just spoken by Musset. The poet blushed to the roots of his hair and became terribly agitated. Out of confusion, he sat down on the sofa and began muttering something incomprehensible. Rossini, seeing Musset's reaction, quickly approached him, shook his hand in a friendly manner, and said with an apologetic smile:

Forgive me, dear Alfred! These are, of course, your poems. It's all my memory, which just committed this literary theft.

HOW TO GRAB FORTUNE BY THE SKIRT?

The art of giving compliments is one of the most important skills that every man who dreams of success in business and, especially, his personal life should master. Psychologist Eric Berne advised all shy young men to joke more in the presence of the object of love. “Tell her,” he taught, “for example, something like this: “The panegyrics of all those who love eternity, multiplied three times, are worth only half of your charms. Ten thousand joys from a magic bag made of deerskin are no more than a mulberry in comparison with a pomegranate, which promises one touch of your lips...” If she doesn't appreciate this, she won't appreciate anything else you have to offer her, and it's best for you to forget about her. If she laughs approvingly, you’ve already half won.”

There are people who need to study diligently to express their feelings so gracefully and originally - these are the majority. But there are also those who received this skill as if from birth. These lucky ones do everything easily and naturally: as if playing, they charm, captivate, seduce and... just as easily slip away. Gioachino Rossini was one of them.

“Women are mistaken in thinking that all men are the same. And men are mistaken in believing that all women are different,” he once joked. Already at the age of 14, the list of “fortresses” he took included as many women as sometimes happens only among mature men and experienced womanizers. His pleasant appearance served only as an addition to his other, more important advantages - wit, resourcefulness, always in a good mood, captivating courtesy, the ability to say pleasant things and conduct an exciting conversation. And in the art of lavishing compliments, it was generally difficult for him to find a worthy opponent. In addition, he was a generous saint: he anointed all women indiscriminately with verbal oil. Including those with whom, in his words, “you could only kiss with your eyes closed.”

IN right time and in the right place, he, an aspiring composer, meets Maria Marcolini, one of the most outstanding singers of his time. She draws attention to the smiling, handsome musician and begins a conversation with him: “Do you like music?” - "Adore". - “Do you like singers too?” - “If they look like you, I adore them, just like music.” Marcolini defiantly looks him straight in the eyes: “Maestro, but this is almost a declaration of love!” - “Why hardly? It came out so spontaneously, and I am not going to renounce it. You can take these words of mine as a light breeze tickling your ears, and let them go free. But I will catch them and return them to you - with great pleasure." The beauty laughs: “I think you and I will get along very well, Gioachino. Why don’t you write a new opera for me?..” This is how, without hesitation, at a glance, you can, as the Italians say, “grab fortune by the skirt”!

Once a journalist asked Rossini a question: “Maestro, everything in life comes easy to you: fame, money, the love of the public!.. Admit it, how did you manage to become the darling of fortune?” “Indeed, fortune loves me,” Rossini answered with a smile, “but only for one simple reason: fortune is a woman and despises those who timidly beg for her love. I don’t pay attention to her, but at the same time I firmly hold this anemone by the hem of her luxurious dress!..”

WHO MEAWS SO FALSELY THERE?

An extravagant merry fellow and adventurer, an endlessly cheerful inventor of all sorts of pranks and jokes, a funny zhuir, always ready to respond to an alluring woman’s smile, a gentle look or a note, how many times did he find himself in funny, piquant and even life-threatening situations! “It happened to me,” he admitted, “to have extraordinary rivals; throughout my life I moved from city to city three times a year and changed friends...”

Once in Bologna, one of his mistresses, Countess B., who lived in Milan, leaving the palace, husband, children, forgetting about her reputation, came one fine day to the room he occupied in a more than modest hotel. They met very tenderly. However, soon, through negligence, the unlocked door opened and... another of Rossini’s mistress appeared on the threshold - Princess K., the most famous beauty of Bologna. Without hesitation, the ladies fought hand-to-hand. Rossini tried to intervene, but he was unable to separate the fighting ladies. During this turmoil, it’s true: trouble doesn’t come alone! - suddenly the closet door opens and... the half-naked Countess F. appears before the eyes of the frantic ladies - another mistress of the maestro, who has been quietly sitting in his closet all this time. What happened next, history, as they say, is silent. For the main character of this “opera buffe”, who by this moment had very wisely taken a place closer to the exit, quickly grabbed his hat and cloak and quickly left the stage. That same day, without warning anyone, he left Bologna.

Another time he was a little less lucky. However, in order to understand the essence of what happened next, let’s make a small remark and retell one of Rossini’s favorite jokes. So: the French Duke Charles the Bold was a warlike fellow and in matters of war he took the famous commander Hannibal as his model. He remembered his name at every step, with or without reason: “I chased him like Hannibal chased Scipio!”, “This is an act worthy of Hannibal!”, “Hannibal would be pleased with you!” and so on. In the battle of Murten, Charles was completely defeated and was forced to flee the battlefield in his carriage. The court jester, fleeing with his master, ran next to the carriage and, from time to time, looking into it, shouted: “Oh, they have driven us away!”

Good joke, isn't it? But let's return to Rossini. In Padua, where he soon arrived, he took a fancy to a charming young lady, known, like himself, for her quirks. However, these quirks are only half the story. The charmer, unfortunately, had an extremely jealous and warlike patron who tirelessly watched over his ward. In order to share the forbidden fruit with the beauty, as Rossini himself later said, “every time at three o’clock in the morning they forced me to meow like a cat; and since I was a composer and was proud of the melody of my music, they demanded of me that, while meowing, I would play false notes...”

It is unknown whether Rossini meowed too falsely, or perhaps too loudly - out of love impatience! - but one day, from the treasured balcony, instead of the usual response “Pur-mur-mur...”, a waterfall of fetid slop fell on him. Humiliated and shitted from head to toe, the unlucky lover, accompanied by the evil laughter of the jealous man and his servants coming from the balcony, hurried home... “Oh, they drove us away!” - he exclaimed every now and then along the way.

Well, apparently, even the favorites of fortune have misfires!

“Usually men give gifts to the beauties they are courting,” Rossini admitted, “but for me it was the other way around - the beauties gave gifts to me, and I didn’t interfere with them... Yes, I didn’t stop them from doing a lot!” He wasn't looking for women - they were looking for him. He didn't ask them for anything - they begged him for attention and love. It would seem that one can only dream about this. But here, imagine, there are some inconveniences. Excessively noisy female jealousy haunted Rossini as persistently as the serious and even life-threatening anger of deceived husbands, forcing him to constantly change hotels, cities and even countries. Sometimes it got to the point that the women themselves offered him money for a night of love with the “divine maestro.” For a self-respecting man, especially an Italian, this is already a shame. Then the ladies resorted to cunning and came to Rossini with a request to take music lessons from him. To scare away unwanted students, the maestro charged unprecedented prices for his musical consultations. However, rich aging ladies happily paid the required amount. Rossini said about this:

Whether you want it or not, you have to get rich... But what is the price! Oh, if only someone knew what kind of torment I have to endure listening to the voices of these elderly singers who creak like ungreased door hinges!

A MONSTERLY WOMAN IN LOVE

One day, returning from another concert tour, Rossini told his friends about an adventure that happened to him in a provincial town, where he staged his opera Tancred. The main role in it was performed by one very famous singer- a lady of unusually tall stature and no less impressive volume.

I conducted, sitting, as always, in my place in the orchestra. When Tancred appeared on stage, I was delighted with the beauty and majestic appearance of the singer who performed the part of the main character. She was no longer young, but still quite attractive. Tall, well-built, with sparkling eyes, in a helmet and armor, she looked really very warlike. On top of that, she sang superbly, with great feeling, so after the aria “Oh, Motherland, ungrateful Motherland...” I shouted: “Bravo, bravissimo!”, and the audience applauded wildly. The singer was apparently very flattered by my approval, because until the end of the act she did not stop casting very expressive glances at me. I decided that I was allowed to visit her in the restroom to thank her for her performance. But as soon as I crossed the threshold, the singer, as if maddened, grabbed the maid by the shoulders, pushed me out and locked the door. Then she rushed towards me and exclaimed in great excitement: “Ah, the moment I’ve been waiting for has finally arrived! There was only one dream in my life - to meet you! Maestro, my idol, hug me!”

Imagine this scene: tall - I barely reached her shoulder - powerful, twice as thick as me, besides in a man's suit, in armor, she rushes towards me, so tiny next to her, presses me to her chest - what a chest! - and squeezes him in a suffocating hug. “Signora,” I tell her, “don’t crush me!” Do you at least have a bench so that I can be at the proper height? And then this helmet and these armor...” - “Oh yes, of course, I haven’t taken off the helmet yet... I’m completely crazy, I don’t know what I’m doing!” And with a sharp movement she throws off her helmet, but it clings to her armor. She tries to tear it off, but cannot. Then she grabs the dagger hanging at her side and with one blow cuts through the cardboard armor, presenting to my astonished gaze something that was not at all military, but very feminine, that was under them. All that remained of the heroic Tancred were the armlets and kneepads.

“Good God! - I shout. - What did you do? “What does it matter now,” she replies. - I want you, maestro! I want you...” - “And the performance? You need to go on stage!” This remark seemed to bring her back to reality, but not quite, and her excitement did not go away, judging by her wild look and nervous excitement. I, however, took advantage of this brief pause, jumped out of the restroom and rushed to look for the maid. “Hurry, hurry! - I told her. - Your mistress is in trouble, her armor is broken, she urgently needs to fix it. She'll be out in a few minutes!" And he hurried to take his place in the orchestra. But we had to wait a long time for its release. The intermission lasted longer than usual, the audience began to be indignant and finally made such a noise that the stage inspector was forced to go out to the ramp. And the audience learned with amazement that Signorina the singer, who plays the role of Tancred, had her armor out of order and was asking permission to go on stage in a cloak. The audience is outraged and expresses displeasure, but the signorina appears without armor, only in a cloak. As soon as the performance ended, I immediately left for Milan and, I hope, I will never have the chance to meet this huge and monstrously in love woman again...

"WHAT IS YOUR NAME?" - “I’M SATISFIED!”

No incidents can bring him to his senses. Once in Vienna he met a nice company of young rakes who, like him, followed the well-known principle of the medieval troubadours - “Wine, women and songs.” Rossini did not know a word of German, except perhaps for one single phrase: “Ich bin zufrieden” - “I am satisfied.” But this did not stop him from making excursions to all the best taverns, tasting local wines and dishes, and participating in fun, albeit somewhat dubious, walks with ladies of “not strict behavior” outside the city.

As expected, this time there was a scandal. “Once, while walking the streets of Vienna,” Rossini later shared his impressions, “I witnessed a fight between two gypsies, one of whom, having received a terrible blow from a dagger, fell onto the sidewalk. Immediately a huge crowd gathered. As soon as I wanted to get out of it, a policeman came up to me and very excitedly said a few words in German, of which I did not understand anything. I answered him very politely: “Ich bin zufrieden.” At first he was taken aback, and then, taking two tones higher, he burst into a tirade, the ferocity of which, it seemed to me, increased in continuous crescendo while I diminuendo, more and more politely and respectfully, repeated my “ich bin zufrieden” in front of this armed man. . Suddenly turning purple with rage, he called another policeman, and both of them, foaming at the mouth, grabbed me by the arms. All I could understand from their shouts was the words “police commissioner.”

Fortunately, when they took me out, they came across a carriage in which the Russian ambassador was traveling. He asked what was going on here. After a short explanation in German, these fellows let me go, apologizing in every possible way. True, I understood the meaning of their verbal curtsies only from their gestures expressing despair and endless bows. The ambassador put me in his carriage and explained that the policeman first asked me only about my name, so that, if necessary, he could call me as a witness to the crime committed before my eyes. After all, he did his duty. But my endless zufrieden infuriated him so much that he took them for mockery and wanted to take me to the commissioner so that he would instill in me respect for the police. When the ambassador told the policeman that I could be excused because I didn't know German language, he was indignant: “This one? Yes, he speaks the purest Viennese dialect!” “Then be polite... and in pure Viennese dialect!”...”

Speaking without exaggeration, Rossini's biography is half facts, half anecdotes. Rossini himself was known as a first-class supplier of all kinds of stories and witticisms. What is true in them and what is fiction - we will not guess. In any case, they almost always correspond to the composer’s character, his extraordinary love of life, spiritual simplicity and lightness. One of his favorite stories is about a Parisian organ grinder.

One day, under the windows of the house where the composer settled when he arrived in Paris, the extremely false sounds of an old barrel organ were heard. It was only because the same melody was repeated several times that Rossini was suddenly surprised to recognize in it an incredibly distorted theme from the overture to his opera William Tell. Extremely angry, he opened the window and was about to order the organ grinder to leave immediately, but he immediately changed his mind and cheerfully shouted to the street musician to come upstairs.

Tell me, buddy, doesn’t your wonderful organ play any of Halévy’s music? - he asked the organ grinder when he appeared at the door. (Halevi is a popular opera composer, at that time a rival and competitor of Rossini. - A.K.)

Still would! "The Cardinal's Daughter"

Great! - Rossini was delighted. - Do you know where he lives?

Certainly. Who in Paris doesn't know this?

Wonderful. Here's a franc for you. Go and play him his "Cardinal's Daughter." The same melody at least six times. Fine?

The organ grinder smiled and shook his head:

I can not. It was Monsieur Halévy who sent me to you. However, he is kinder than you: he asked to play your overture only three times.

“RUN JUBOV LIKE RUN YOUR HANDS...”

Beauty is a credential. One of the maestro’s little weaknesses is narcissism. He was very proud of his appearance. Once, in a conversation with a certain important church minister who visited him at the hotel, he said: “You talk about my glory, but do you know, monsignor, what is my real right to immortality? The fact that I am the most beautiful of the people of our time! Canova (famous Italian sculptor - A.K.) told me that he was going to sculpt Achilles from me!” With these words, he jumps out of bed and appears before the eyes of the Roman prelate in the costume of Adam: “Look at this leg! Look at this hand! I think that when a person is so well built, he can be confident in his immortality...” The prelate opens his mouth and begins to slowly back away towards the exit. Pleased, Rossini bursts into wild laughter.

“Whoever eats a lot of sweets will know what toothache is; whoever indulges his lust brings his old age closer.” Rossini could serve as a clear example for this quote from Avicenna. Excessive work (about 40 operas in 16 years!), incessant travel and rehearsals, an incredible number of love affairs, plus the most natural gluttony turned a handsome man bursting with health and energy into a sick old man. Already at thirty-four he looked at least ten years older. At thirty-nine he lost all his hair and teeth. His whole appearance also changed: his once slender figure was disfigured by obesity, the corners of his mouth sagged, his lips, due to the lack of teeth, wrinkled and retracted like those of an ancient old woman, and his chin, on the contrary, protruded, further disfiguring his once beautiful face.

But Rossini is still a big hunter of pleasure. The cellars of his house are overflowing with bottles and barrels of wine from different countries. These are gifts from countless fans, among whom there are many august persons. But now he savors these gifts more and more alone. And even then secretly - doctors forbid it... The same goes for food: you have to limit yourself. Only here the problem is not some kind of prohibition, but the lack of physical ability to eat what you would like. “You can do without teeth as a decoration for your face,” he complains, with an exaggerated lisp, “but unfortunately, it’s impossible without teeth as a tool for eating...”

Rossini carries his artificial teeth with him in a handkerchief and shows them to everyone who is curious. But somehow suspiciously often he drops them (and at the most inopportune moment, right from his mouth!) either into the broth, or, in moments of loud laughter (the maestro doesn’t know how to laugh any other way), simply on the floor, causing a violent reaction in circle of aesthetic gentlemen and prim gentlemen. Perhaps only the lazy and dumb don’t laugh at his dentures. However, the maestro seems not to be offended, but, on the contrary, rejoices at such glory.

The artist De Sanctis, who painted a portrait of the aged composer, noted: “He has a beautiful, ideally shaped head, not a single hair on it, and it is so smooth and pink that it glows like alabaster...”. The composer also had no complexes regarding his “alabaster” head. No, he didn’t show it off to everyone like he did his false teeth. He skillfully disguised it with the help of numerous and varied wigs.

“I have the most beautiful hair in the world,” he wrote in one of his letters to a lady he knew, “or rather, even the most beautiful, because I have it for every season and for all occasions. You probably think that I shouldn’t say “my hair” because it’s someone else’s hair? But the hair is really mine, because I bought it, and paid a lot. They are mine, just like the clothes I buy, so it seems to me that I can quite rightly consider this other people’s hair, for which I paid money, to be mine.”

Legends were made about Rossini's wigs. They assured him that he had a hundred of them. There really were a lot of wigs: different textures, different styles, hairstyles, characters. Light and wavy - for spring days, for hot sunny weather; strict, important and respectable - for cloudy days and special occasions. There was also a purely Rossini invention - wigs with a “moral connotation” (probably for not very beautiful fans...). In addition, he had separate wigs for weddings, sad wigs for funerals, charming wigs for dances, receptions and social gatherings, important wigs for public places, "frivolous" curly wigs for dates... If anyone tried to joke, surprised that such an outstanding person as Rossini had a weakness for wigs, the maestro was perplexed:

Why weakness? If I wear a wig, then at least I have a head. I know some, even very important people, who, if they decided to wear a wig, would have nothing to wear it with...

"ARISTOCRATS HAVE NO NEED TO GENERATE..."

“Whenever possible, I am always happy to do nothing,” declared the author of “The Barber of Seville.” However, calling Rossini a lazy person is hard to come by. To write 40 operas, as well as more than a hundred other musical works of different genres, is a huge job. Why does everyone say that he is an exemplary lazy person?

Here is what the composer himself said about this: “In general, I believe that a person feels excellent only in bed, and I am convinced that the true, natural position of a person is horizontal. And the vertical one - on legs - was probably invented later by some vain guy who wanted to be known as an original. Well, since, unfortunately, there are enough crazy people in the world, humanity was forced to take a vertical position.” Of course, what was said seems more like a joke. But she is not far from the truth.

Rossini composed his famous operas not at the piano or at the table, but mostly in bed. One day, wrapped up in a blanket - it was winter outside - he was composing a duet for a new opera. Suddenly a sheet of music paper slipped out of his hands and fell under the bed. Getting out of a warm, cozy bed? It's easier for Rossini to compose a new duet. He did just that. When, after some time, the first duet was removed (with the help of a friend) from under the bed, Rossini adapted it for another opera - the good stuff wouldn’t go to waste!

“Labor must always be avoided,” Rossini argued. - They say that work ennobles a person. But this makes me think that it is precisely for this reason that many noble gentlemen and aristocrats do not work - they do not need to ennoble themselves.” Those who knew Rossini well understood that the maestro was not joking at all.

“Genius,” said the famous inventor Thomas Edison, “is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.” It seems that this formula is not at all suitable for the great maestro. Let us allow ourselves a bold statement: the enormous legacy of the Italian composer is the result not so much of shed sweat as of the play of a genius. Talents sweat, geniuses create by playing. In his business, in composing music, Rossini considered himself truly omnipotent. He could make a “candy” out of anything. His saying is well known: “Give me a laundry bill and I’ll set it to music.” Beethoven marveled at the author of “The Barber”: “Rossini... writes with such ease that it takes him as many weeks to compose one opera as it would take a German composer years.”

Rossini's genius has two sides: one is the fantastic fruitfulness and lightness of his muse, the other is neglect of his own gift, laziness and “epicureanism.” Life philosophy the composer boiled down to the following: “Try to avoid any troubles, and if this fails, try to be upset about them as little as possible, never worry about what does not concern you, never lose your temper, except in the most extreme cases, because it is always more expensive for yourself, even if you are right, and especially if you are right. And most importantly, always take care not to disturb your peace, this gift of the gods.”

Despite the fact that Rossini wrote his operas, in comparison with other composers, almost with lightning speed, there were often cases with him when he did not have time to finish the score on time. It was the same with the overture to the opera “Othello”: the premiere is just around the corner, but there is still no overture! The director of the San Carlo Theater, without hesitation, lured the composer into an empty room with bars on the window and locked him in it, leaving him only a plate of spaghetti, and promising that until the last note of the overture was played, Rossini would not leave his "prison" and will not receive food. While locked up, the composer very quickly finished the overture.

It was the same with the overture to the opera “The Thieving Magpie,” which he composed under the same conditions, locked in a room, and he composed it on the day of the premiere! Stage workers stood under the window of the “prison” and caught the finished sheets of music, then ran to the music copyists. The furious director of the theater ordered the people guarding Rossini: if the sheets of musical score are not thrown out of the window, then throw the composer himself out of the window!

The absence of fine food, wine, a soft bed and other usual pleasures only spurred Rossini’s already energetic muse. (By the way, is this why there is so much fast music in his operas?) In addition, another incentive for the speedy completion of the opera was the threats of the theater director, Domenico Barbaia, from whom Rossini treacherously “stole” his mistress, the beautiful and wealthy prima singer Isabella Colbran, having married her. There were rumors that Barbaya even wanted to challenge the maestro to a duel... But now he locked him in a cramped room and is only waiting for some kind of overture from him. It seems that our composer got off easy: it’s easier for him to write a dozen overtures than to participate in a duel and risk his life. Although Rossini, of course, is a genius, he is clearly not a hero...

SENSE COWARD

Once in Bologna, while still a young and little-known musician, Rossini wrote a revolutionary song that inspired the Italians to fight for liberation from the Austrian yoke. The young composer understood that after this it was not at all safe for him to remain in the city occupied by Austrian troops. However, it was impossible to leave Bologna without the permission of the Austrian commandant. Rossini came to him for a pass.

Who you are? - asked the Austrian general.

I am a musician and composer, but not like that robber Rossini, who writes revolutionary songs. I love Austria and have written for you a bravura military march, which you can give to your military bands to learn.

Rossini gave the general the notes with the march and received a pass in return. The next day the march was learned, and the Austrian military band performed it in Bologna Square. And yet it was the same revolutionary song.

When the people of Bologna heard the familiar tune, they were delighted and immediately picked it up. One can imagine how furious the Austrian general was and how he regretted that “this robber Rossini” was already outside Bologna.

This incident is a rare example of Rossini's courageous behavior. Rather, it is not even courage, but ordinary mischief, the audacity of youth. He who loves life and its pleasures very much is rarely brave.

Fearing conscription for military service, Rossini diligently avoided meeting with the military gendarmerie, constantly changing his place of overnight stay. When sometimes the patrol caught him on the spot, he pretended to be an indignant creditor of Rossini, whom the latter, not wanting to pay his debt, meanly avoided. It is unknown how this game of hide and seek would have ended if the head of the Milan garrison had not turned out to be a great music lover. It turns out that he was at La Scala for the triumphant performance of Touchstone and was delighted with the opera. And he believes that it would be unfair to expose Rossini’s newly born musical fame to the difficulties and dangers of military life. Therefore, the general signs him a release from military service. The happy maestro comes to thank him:

General, now thanks to you I can write music again. I’m not sure, however, that the art of music will be as grateful to you as I am...

Do you have any doubts? And I - not at all. Don't be modest.

But I can assure you of something else - you will undoubtedly be grateful to the art of war, because I would be a bad soldier.

This is where I agree with you! - the general laughs.

The Italian writer Arnaldo Fraccaroli in his book “Rossini” gives a story about one episode from the composer’s life. “When Rossini arrived in Rome, he immediately called the barber and he shaved him for several days, not allowing himself any familiarity with him. But when the day of the first orchestral rehearsal of “Torvaldo” approached, he, having completed his task with all care, shook hands with the composer without ceremony, kindly adding: “See you!” - "So how?" - asked a somewhat puzzled Rossini. - “Yes, we will see you at the theater soon.” - "In the theatre?" - exclaimed the surprised maestro. - “Of course. I am the first trumpet player in the orchestra."

This discovery made Rossini, a man of no courage, think. He was very strict and demanding during the rehearsals of his operas. False note, the wrong rhythm made him angry. He shouted, cursed, became furious, seeing how the fruits of his inspiration were distorted beyond recognition. Then he did not spare anyone, even the most revered artists. However, the thought that he could acquire a mortal enemy in the person of a man who runs a sharp blade across his face every day made him become more restrained. No matter how great the mistakes made by the trumpeter-barber were, the composer did not make the slightest reproach to him in the theater, and only the next day after shaving he politely pointed them out to him, which made him incredibly flattered and tried to please his famous client.”

A great aficionado of travel and, in his own words, a sensible coward, Rossini always chose horses and teams with special care - even just to make the five-minute trip from home to the theater. He preferred horses that were thin and tired, which would surely trudge along slowly and calmly, without exposing them to any danger. “After all, you sit in a stroller in order to get where you need to go, and not in order to rush headlong!”

"THE TRIANGLE OF PLEASURE"

One of his biographers said: “if Rossini had not been a great composer, he, of course, would have been awarded the title of the greatest gastronome of the 19th century.” Indeed, nature rewarded the Italian composer with an enviable appetite and exquisite taste. The combination, it must be said, is very favorable, because a good appetite without taste is stupid gluttony, and taste without appetite is almost a perversion.

“As for me,” Rossini confessed, “I don’t know a more wonderful activity than food... What love is to the heart, appetite is to the stomach. The stomach is the conductor who leads the large orchestra of our passions and puts them into action. An empty stomach is like a bassoon or a piccolo when it rumbles with displeasure or plays roulades with desire. On the contrary, a full stomach is a triangle of pleasure or a timpani of joy. As for love, I consider it as a prima donna, as a goddess who sings the brain with cavatina, intoxicates the ear and delights the heart. Eating, love, singing and digestion - these are truly the four acts of the comic opera called life and which disappears like the foam from a bottle of champagne. Anyone who experiences it without pleasure is a complete fool.”

Only a true epicure could say this. And, like any connoisseur of simple and natural pleasures, Rossini could talk for hours about the advantages and disadvantages of this or that cuisine, this or that dish or sauce. He called haute cuisine and beautiful music “two trees of the same root.”

Rossini was not only an excellent eater, but also a skilled cook. He loved his cooking as much as he loved his music. His biographers still disagree on how many times the maestro cried in his life. Some argue that twice: from joy - when he first heard Paganini, and from grief - when he dropped a dish of pasta he had prepared with his own hands. The majority is inclined to believe that four times: after listening to Paganini, after the failure of the first opera, after receiving the news of the death of the mother, and also after the fall of the coveted dish. Most likely, it was a turkey stuffed with truffles that he had prepared for the holiday dinner, which fell over the side of the boat where the picnic was taking place. For this bird with his favorite delicious mushrooms, the composer was ready to give, if not his soul, then certainly any of his operas. Not to mention strangers - after all, it was about these unusual mushrooms that Rossini concluded: “I can only compare truffles with Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni.” The more you taste of them, the greater the delight revealed to you.”

The composer never missed the opportunity to savor turkey stuffed with truffles, former cause mass gourmet craze of that time. Rossini once won a bet on his favorite delicacy. However, he had to wait an unacceptably long time for his coveted winnings. In response to the maestro’s persistent claims, the loser made excuses every time - either by an unsuccessful season, or by the fact that the first good truffles had not yet appeared. “Nonsense, nonsense! - Rossini shouted. “These are just false rumors spread by turkeys who don’t want to be stuffed!”

Rossini's letters are full of cooking. Even love ones. In one of his letters to his beloved, he writes: “What is much more interesting to me than music, dear Angelica, is my invention of a wonderful, incomparable salad. The recipe looks like this: take a little Provençal oil, a little English mustard, a few drops of French vinegar, pepper, salt, lettuce and a little lemon juice. Truffles of the highest quality are also cut there. Everything mixes well.”

A few years ago a book called “Rossini and the Sin of Gluttony” was published in Paris. It contains about fifty recipes invented by the famous gourmet of his time. For example, the “Figaro” salad from boiled veal tongue, cannelloni (pasta) a la Rossini, and, of course, the famous “Rossini Tournedo” - fried tenderloin with foie gras and Madeira sauce. There is also a legend about how this delicious dish got its name.

It all happened at Cafe Anglais in Paris. Allegedly, Rossini insisted on preparing the dish under personal supervision and ordered the chef to cook in a room that could be viewed from his table. While preparing the dish, the maestro constantly commented on the chef’s actions, constantly giving him important, from his point of view, instructions and advice. When the cook finally became indignant at the constant interference, the maestro exclaimed: “Et alors! Tournez le dos!” - "Ah well! Then turn back!” In a word, “tournedeau”.

WHAT IS “GERMAN HALIBUT”?

Like any outstanding person, Rossini had his own antipode. His name is Richard Wagner, the famous German composer. If Rossini is lightness, melody, emotionality, then Wagner is monumentality, pomp and rationality. Each of them had desperate fans who clashed in fierce polemics. Fans of the Italian maestro mercilessly ridiculed the operas of “Mr. Rumbling,” as Wagner was nicknamed in Italy, for their emotional dryness, lack of melody and excessive volume. The Germans, who considered themselves “trend setters” in philosophy, science and music, were unhappy that their authority was called into question by some upstart Italian, whom all of Europe suddenly began to rave about. Therefore, they accused Rossini and other Italian composers of frivolity and profanity - they say that these are not real composers, but organ grinders, pandering to the tastes of the unassuming crowd. But what did the composers themselves say about each other?

Wagner, after listening to several of Rossini's operas, declared that this fashionable Italian was nothing more than a “clever manufacturer of artificial flowers.” Rossini, having attended one of Wagner’s operas, remarked: “You need to listen to such music more than once or twice. But I can’t do it more than once.”

Rossini did not hide his dislike for the music of the German composer. One of the anecdotes tells how one day in the Rossini house, when everyone sat on the terrace after dinner with glasses of sweet wine, an unimaginable noise came from the dining room. There was a ringing, knocking, roar, crackling, hum and, finally, a groan and a grinding sound. The guests froze in amazement. Rossini ran to the dining room. A minute later he returned to the guests with a smile:

Thank God - it was the maid who caught the tablecloth and knocked over the entire table setting. And just imagine, I sinfully thought that someone dared to play the overture to “Tannhäuser” in my house!

“Where is Wagner’s melody? - Rossini was indignant. “Yes, something is ringing there, something is jingling, but it seems he himself doesn’t know why it’s ringing and why it’s jingling!” Once, to one of his weekly dinners, he invited several music critics, passionate fans of Wagner. The main dish on the menu at this dinner was “German-style halibut.” Knowing the great culinary skills of the maestro, the guests were looking forward to this delicacy. When it was the turn of the halibut, the servants served a very appetizing sauce. Everyone put it on their plates and began to wait for the main course... But the mysterious “German-style halibut” was never served. The guests were embarrassed and began to whisper: what to do with the sauce? Then Rossini, amused by their confusion, exclaimed:

What are you waiting for, gentlemen? Try the sauce, trust me, it's great! As for the halibut, alas... The fish supplier forgot to deliver it. But don't be surprised! Isn't that what we see in Wagner's music? The sauce is good, but it doesn't have halibut! There is no melody!

When Rossini settled in Paris, fans, musicians and simply famous people flocked to him, as if to Mecca, from all over Europe - to see with their own eyes living legend and express my admiration for him. Wagner, having arrived in Paris, witnessed this pilgrimage, which was unpleasant for him. In one of his letters home, he reported: “True, I haven’t seen Rossini yet, but they write caricatures of him here as a fat epicurean, stuffed not with music, since he has long since emptied himself of it, but with Bologna sausage.” Imagine Rossini’s surprise when he was informed of Wagner’s ardent desire to visit the “great maestro” in his house.

The meeting of the two composers took place. What could these two completely different people be talking about? Of course, about music. After this conversation, all their personal misunderstandings were resolved. Despite the fact that Rossini still did not understand Wagner’s music, now he was not so categorical in his assessments, and already spoke about it like this: “In Wagner there are charming moments and terrible quarters of an hour.” Wagner also changed his mind about the “clever manufacturer of artificial flowers”:

I confess,” he said after a conversation with Rossini, “I did not expect to meet the Rossini that he turned out to be - a simple, direct, serious man, with a lively interest in everything we talked about... Like Mozart, he is in the most has a high degree of melodic gift, which is supported by an amazing flair for the stage and dramatic expressiveness... Of all the musicians I met in Paris, he is the only truly great musician!

(As you know, Wagner loved his music and his own artistic exclusivity much more than truth and art. According to his views, if art was not created by him, then it is not art. One has to be surprised at this flattering and, of course, sincere review of Wagner about Rossini. Be that as it may, these words do honor to the German composer.)

A SMALL CRACK IN A BIG HEART

“To tell the truth,” Rossini admitted at the end of his life, “I am still more capable of writing comic operas. I was more willing to take on comic subjects than serious ones. Unfortunately, it was not I who chose the libretto for myself, but my impresarios. How many times have I had to compose music with only the first act before my eyes and no idea how the action develops and how the whole opera will end? Just think... at that time I had to feed my father, mother and grandmother. Roaming from city to city, I wrote three or four operas a year. And, you can believe me, he was still far from material well-being. For “The Barber of Seville” I received from the impresario one thousand two hundred francs and a gift of a walnut-colored suit with gold buttons, so that I could appear in the orchestra in decent form. This outfit cost, perhaps, one hundred francs, therefore a total of one thousand three hundred francs. Since I wrote “The Barber of Seville” in thirteen days, it came out to one hundred francs a day. “As you can see,” Rossini added, smiling, “I still received a handsome salary.” I was very proud of my own father, who, when he was a trumpeter in Pesaro, received only two francs and fifty centimes a day.”

A decisive turning point in Rossini's financial situation came on the day when he decided to throw in his lot with Isabella Colbran. This marriage brought Rossini twenty thousand livres of annual income. Until this day, Rossini could not afford to buy more than two suits a year.

There is a constant lack of money - but how can someone who is not used to denying themselves big and small pleasures have enough of it? - little by little they turned Rossini, a naturally grateful and generous man, into an excellent miser. When Rossini was asked if he had friends, he answered: “Of course there are. Messrs. Rothschild and Morgan." - “Who are the millionaires?” - “Yes, those same ones.” - “Probably, maestro, you chose such friends for yourself so that, if necessary, you could borrow money from them?” - “On the contrary, I call them friends precisely because they never borrow money from me!”

The maestro's extreme economy served as a source of numerous jokes and anecdotes. One of them tells of Rossini’s home musical evenings, which almost always took place in ominous twilight. The huge living room was lit only by two meager candles on the piano. Once, when the concert was coming to an end, and the flame was already licking the rosette of the candlestick, one of the friends remarked to the composer that it would be nice to add more candles. To which Rossini replied:

Would you advise the ladies to wear more diamonds, they sparkle in the dark and are a great substitute for lighting...

The famous dinners given by the “generous” Rossini spouses did not cost them practically a single lira or franc. At the request of the “divine maestro”, each invitee had to... bring food with him. Some carried exquisite fish, others - expensive wines, others - rare fruits... Well, Mrs. Rossini, without the slightest hesitation, reminded the guests of this “duty”. If there were a lot of guests (which was especially beneficial for the sake of economy), then the number of dishes brought was many times greater than the needs of one lunch, and the surplus was happily hidden in the host’s buffet - until the next lunch...

But for “especially solemn” dinners on Saturdays, Rossini does not take into account any expenses. However, his second wife, Signora Olympia, is unable to cope with her stinginess. Every time there are vases with amazingly fresh fruit on a beautifully set table. But it almost never comes to their attention. And all because of Signora Olympia. Then she suddenly feels bad and leaves the table, and if the hostess gets up, the guests also get up, then Tonino’s servant will appear with some kind of specially prepared news or message about an urgent visit, in a word, an obstacle always arises between the guests and the fruit. One day, one of Rossini's regular guests gives the servant a good tip and asks why guests in Rossini's house never get to try fruit.

It’s very simple,” the servant admits, “Madame rents fruit and must return it.”

And yet, let's be honest: stinginess, no matter how funny it sometimes looks, is still an unsightly and repulsive thing. For a man, this is completely a vice. Having parted with his first wife, Isabella Colbran, Rossini left her Villa Castenaso - the same villa that belonged to her before his marriage, one hundred and fifty crowns a month (pathetic crumbs!) and a modest apartment in the city for the winter. He told his friends:

I acted nobly, in any case, everyone is opposed to her because of her endless follies.

By madness he meant her passion for cards...

On this occasion, Arnaldo Fraccaroli exclaims with regret: “Ah, Gioachino, the greatest and most famous maestro, have you already forgotten the years spent in Naples, how she helped in your triumphs? What kind, nice, generous friend was she? How expensive it is for people, even the greatest, to think about this metal! And how many cracks there are in the human heart, even in those who are gifted with a spark of genius!”

“AND THERE IS NO MOM! MOM IS NO MORE..."

Perhaps the only person Rossini truly loved was his mother. He never wrote such long letters to anyone, was not so frank with anyone, did not worry and care about anyone as much as he did about his mother. To her, his beloved, he without any hesitation addresses his messages, full of ardent love and respect: “To the most beautiful Signora Rossini, mother of the famous maestro, in Bologna.” All his victories are her happiness, all his failures are her tears.

His mother's death was a shock from which he was never able to recover. A month after her funeral, on the day of the premiere of his new opera “Moses,” the public began to demand the author to appear on stage. To calls, to insistent demands to go out to bow, he answered: “No, no, leave me!” Decisive action was needed and he was almost forcefully brought onto the stage to the audience. In response to a hurricane of applause and frantic shouts, Rossini bowed several times, and the spectators in the nearest rows were amazed to see tears in the maestro’s eyes. Is it possible? Is it possible that Rossini, an incorrigible lover of life and joker, a man without unnecessary prejudices, was so excited? So, the storm of this success shook him too? But only the artists standing nearby could understand the mystery of this excitement. Leaving the stage, they said, the winner muttered through tears, inconsolably, like a child: “But there’s no mother!” Mom is no more..."

The death of his mother, the failure of his new opera “William Tell,” the decision of the new French government to deny him a previously assigned pension, stomach pain, impotence and other misfortunes that fell upon him at once led to severe depression. The craving for loneliness began to take possession of him more and more, displacing his natural inclination to have fun. At the age of 39, having fallen ill with neurasthenia, Rossini, at that time the most famous and sought-after composer in Europe, suddenly quit composing music, abandoned social life and former friends, and retire to his small house in Bologna with his new wife, the French Olympia Pelissier.

In the next four decades, the composer did not write a single opera. His entire creative baggage over the years consists of several small compositions in the vocal and instrumental genres. In just twenty years he had achieved everything, and suddenly - complete silence and demonstrative detachment from the world. Such a cessation of composer activity at the very zenith of skill and fame is a unique phenomenon in the history of world musical culture.

When the illness began to inspire serious fears for his psyche, Olympia persuaded him to change the situation and go to Paris. Fortunately, the treatment in France was successful: very slowly his physical and mental condition began to improve. A share of, if not gaiety, then wit returned to him; music, which had been a taboo subject for many years, began to come to his mind again. April 15, 1857 - Olympia's name day - became a kind of turning point: on this day Rossini dedicated a cycle of romances to his wife, which he composed in secret from everyone. It was hard to believe in this miracle: the brain of a great man, which was considered extinguished forever, suddenly lit up again with a bright light!

The cycle of romances was followed by a number of small plays - Rossini called them “The Sins of My Old Age.” Finally, in 1863, the last - and truly significant - work of Rossini appeared: “Little Solemn Mass”. This mass is not very solemn and not at all small, but beautiful in music and imbued with deep sincerity.

Rossini died on November 13, 1868 and was buried in Paris at the Père Lachaise cemetery. The maestro left behind two and a half million tailcoats. He bequeathed most of these funds to the creation of a music school in Pesaro. Expressing his gratitude to France for its hospitality, he established two annual prizes of three thousand francs for the best performance of operatic or sacred music and for an outstanding libretto in verse or prose. He also allocated a large sum for the creation of a home for elderly French singers, as well as vocalists from Italy who had made a career in France.

After 19 years, at the request of the Italian government, the coffin with the composer’s body was transported to Florence and buried in the Church of Santa Croce next to the ashes of Galileo, Michelangelo, Machiavelli and other great Italians.

"LIFE WOULD BE A MISTAKE WITHOUT MUSIC"

Trying to explain the secret of the extraordinary attractiveness of Rossini’s music, Stendhal wrote: “The main feature of Rossini’s music is speed, which in itself distracts the soul from sadness. It's a freshness that makes me smile with pleasure with every beat. There is no need to think about any difficulties: we are completely in the grip of the pleasure that has captured us. I don’t know of any other music that would have such a purely physical effect on you... That’s why the scores of all other composers seem heavy and boring compared to Rossini’s music.”

Leo Tolstoy once wrote the following entry in his diary: “I will not be upset if this world goes to hell. I just feel sorry for the music.” Friedrich Nietzsche said: “Without music, life would be a mistake.” Maybe music is just that little thing that makes our life more or less bearable?

What exactly is music? This is, first of all, our experience. And the task of any music, in the words of Bertrand Russell, is to give us emotions, the main of which are joy and consolation. If Bach is purification and humility, Beethoven is despair and hope, Mozart is play and laughter, then Rossini is delight and joy. The delight is sincere and unbridled. And the joy is pure and jubilant, like in childhood...

For this joy - our deepest bow to you, Signor Gioachino Rossini! And our grateful applause:

Bravo, maestro! Bravo, Rossini!! Bravissimo!!!

Alexander KAZAKEVICH

(1792-1868) Italian composer

G. Rossini is an outstanding Italian composer of the last century, whose work marked the heyday of the national opera art. He managed to breathe new life into the traditional Italian types of opera - comic (buffa) and “serious” (seria). Rossini's talent was revealed especially clearly in opera buffa. The realism of life sketches, accuracy in depicting characters, swiftness of action, melodic richness and sparkling wit ensured his works enormous popularity.

Rossini's period of intense creativity lasted about 20 years. During this time, he created over 30 operas, many of which in a short time went around the capital theaters of Europe and brought the author worldwide fame.

Gioachino Rossini was born on February 29, 1792 in Pesaro. The future composer had a wonderful voice and sang in church choirs from the age of 8. At age 14, he undertook a solo trip with a small theater company as a conductor. Rossini completed his education at the Bologna Musical Lyceum, after which he chose the path of an opera composer.

Moving from city to city and fulfilling orders from local theaters, he wrote several operas a year. The works created in 1813 - the opera buffa "Italian in Algiers" and the heroic opera-serial "Tancred" - brought him wide fame. The melodies of Rossini's arias were sung on the streets of Italian cities. “In Italy there lives a man,” Stendhal wrote, “about whom they talk more than about Napoleon; this is a composer who is not yet twenty years old.”

In 1815, Rossini was invited to become resident composer at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples. It was one of the best theaters of that time, with excellent singers and musicians. The first opera he wrote in Naples, “Elizabeth, Queen of England,” was received with enthusiasm. A stage of calm, prosperous life began in Rossini’s life. It was in Naples that all his major operas were written. His musical and theatrical style reached high maturity in the monumental heroic operas Moses (1818) and Mohammed II (1820). In 1816, Rossini wrote the comic opera “The Barber of Seville” based on the famous comedy by Beaumarchais. Its premiere was also a triumphant success, and soon the whole of Italy was singing melodies from this opera.

In 1822, the political reaction that occurred in Italy forced Rossini to leave his homeland. He went on tour with a group of artists. They performed in London, Berlin, Vienna. There Rossini met Beethoven, Schubert and Berlioz.

From 1824 he settled in Paris. For several years he served as director of the Italian opera house. Taking into account the requirements of the French stage, he reworked a number of previous operas and created new ones. Rossini's greatest achievement was the heroic-romantic opera William Tell (1829), which glorified the leader of the national liberation struggle in Switzerland in the 14th century. Appearing on the eve of the 1830 revolution, this opera responded to the freedom-loving sentiments of the leading part of French society. "William Tell" is Rossini's last opera.

In the prime of his creative powers, not yet forty years old, Rossini suddenly stopped writing opera music. He was involved in concert activities, composed instrumental pieces, and traveled a lot. In 1836 he returned to Italy, living first in Bologna and then in Florence. In 1848, Rossini composed the Italian national anthem.

But soon after this he returned to France again and settled on his estate in Passy, ​​near Paris. His house became one of the centers of artistic life. Many famous singers, composers, and writers attended the musical evenings that he organized. In particular, there are known memories of one of these concerts, written by I. S. Turgenev. It is curious that one of Rossini’s hobbies during these years was cooking. He loved to treat his guests to his own prepared dishes. “Why do you need my music if you have my pate?” - the composer jokingly said to one of the guests.

Gioachino Rossini died on November 13, 1868. A few years later, his ashes were transported to Florence and solemnly buried in the pantheon of the Church of Santa Croce next to the remains of other prominent figures of Italian culture.

Gioachino Antonio Rossini(1792-1868) - an outstanding Italian composer, author of 39 operas, sacred and chamber music.

short biography

Born in Pesaro (Italy), in the family of a horn player. In 1810 he wrote the opera "The Marriage Bill", which did not receive recognition. Success came to Rossini three years later, when his opera Tancred was staged in Venice, winning the largest opera stages in Italy. Since then, success has accompanied him in almost all European countries. In 1815, he signed a contract in Naples with the entrepreneur D. Barbaya, pledging to write two operas a year for a constant annual salary. Until 1823, the composer worked selflessly, fulfilling the terms of the contract. At the same time, he went on tour to Vienna, where he received an enthusiastic reception.

Having stayed briefly in Venice and having written the opera “Semiramide” for the local theater there, Rossini went to London, where he enjoyed enormous success as a composer and conductor, and then to Paris. In Paris, he becomes director of the Italian Opera, but is soon fired from this position. Considering Rossini's merits as the greatest composer of the era, the position of chief intendant of royal music was created for him, and then the chief inspector of singing in France.

Having completed work on William Tell in 1829, Rossini did not write another opera until his death. All his composing work of this time was limited to "Stabat Mater", several chamber and choral works and songs. This is perhaps the only case in the history of music when the composer himself deliberately interrupted his creative work.

At times he also conducted, but mostly he enjoyed the fame of an honored musician-composer and worked in the kitchen. A great gourmet, he loved delicious dishes and knew how to cook them, endlessly inventing new recipes. For some time he was a co-owner of the Paris Opera House. From 1836 he lived in Italy, mainly in Bologna, but after 19 years he returned to Paris again and never left it until the end of his life.

When it was decided, during Rossini’s lifetime, to erect a monument worth two million lire in his homeland in Pesaro, the composer did not agree, objecting: “Give me this money, and every day for two years I will stand for two hours on the plinth in any position.” .

Rossini's creative heritage includes 37 operas ("The Barber of Seville", "The Thieving Magpie", "The Italian Woman in Algiers", "Cinderella", "William Tell", etc.), "Stabat Mater", 15 cantatas, numerous choral works, songs, chamber works (mainly quartets for wind instruments). His music is in the style of late classicism and Italian traditions. She is distinguished by her extraordinary temperament, inexhaustible melodic diversity, lightness, brilliant use of all shades of instruments and performing voices (including a never-before-heard coloratura mezzo-soprano), rich accompaniment, independent interpretation of orchestral parts, and skillful characterization of stage situations. All these merits put Rossini, along with Mozart and Wagner, among the greatest opera composers.

Works

Rossini D. A.

(Rossini) Gioachino Antonio (29 II 1792, Pesaro - 13 XI 1868, Passy, ​​near Paris) - Italian. composer. His father, a man of progressive, republican convictions, was a mountain musician. spirit. orchestra, mother - singer. He studied playing the spinet initially with G. Prinetti, and later (in Luga) with G. Malherbi. Possessing an excellent voice and outstanding music. abilities, R. sang in church since childhood. choirs OK. 1804 R.'s family settled in Bologna. R. studied with A. Thesea (singing, playing the cymbal, music theory), and later with M. Babini (singing); He also mastered the art of playing the viola and violin. He sang with success in the theaters and churches of Bologna, was a choir conductor and accompanist (accompanied on the cymbal) in opera theaters, Spanish. viola part in an amateur strings competition he organized. quartet. Since 1806 (at the age of 14) member. Bologna Philharmonic academy. In 1806-10 he studied at the Bologna Museum. Lyceum with V. Cavedagna (cello), S. Mattei (counterpoint), as well as in the php class. Simultaneously wrote a number of works: 2 symphonies, 5 strings. quartets, the cantata “Harmony’s Complaint about the Death of Orpheus” (Spanish in 1808 under the direction of the author), etc. In 1806 he composed the first opera “Demetrio and Polibio” (post. 1812, Rome) in the traditional style. opera seria genre. In 1810, his farce “Promissory Note for Marriage” was performed. Already here the bright and original music-theater appeared. R.'s talent, his melodiousness. generosity. Mastering the skill, R. wrote several times. operas per year (in 1812 - 5 operas, unequal, but indicating the formation of the author’s creative individuality). In comic In operas, the composer found original solutions. Thus, in the farce “The Happy Deception” he created a type of operatic overture that became characteristic of most of his operas written for Italy: a contrasting juxtaposition of a melodious, slow introduction and a temperamental, cheerful, swift allegro, usually built on cheerful, perky and lyrical, crafty themes . Thematic There is no connection between the opera and the overture, but the coloring of the latter corresponds to the general emotional and psychological. the tone of the opera (an example of such an overture is in the farce “The Silk Staircase”, 1812). His next opera buffa, Touchstone (1812, commissioned by La Scala), was distinguished not only by its wit and cheerfulness of music, but also by its expressiveness and satire. accuracy of character depiction. The opera seria "Tancred" and the opera buffa "Italian in Algiers" (both 1813) reflected patriotic ideas. ideas that inspired Italy. the people, in an atmosphere of strengthening national liberation. Carbonari movements. These operas showed reformist tendencies, although the composer has not yet broken the boundaries of tradition. genres. In "Tancred" (based on Voltaire's historical tragedy of the same name), R. introduced heroic choruses. marching in nature, imbued with the intonations of mass fighting songs, developed the drum. recitative scenes, created by heroic. arias of a folk song type (however, according to tradition, the role of the courageous Tancred was intended for a travesty singer). R.'s opera buffa, "An Italian Woman in Algeria," replete with sharply comedic scenes, was enriched with pathetic writing. and heroic. episodes (the heroine’s aria accompanied by a choir, a militant marching choir of Italians, in which the intonations of “La Marseillaise” are heard, etc.).

Simultaneously R. continued to write traditions. opera buffa (for example, "The Turk in Italy", 1814) and opera seria ("Aurelian in Palmyra", 1813; "Sigismondo", 1814; "Elizabeth, Queen of England", 1815, etc.), but also he introduced innovations in them. So, for the first time in history, Italy. opera artist R. wrote out all the virtuoso vocals in the score of “Elizabeth”. decorations and passages that were previously improvised by singers; he introduced strings to accompany the recitatives. instruments of the orchestra, thereby eliminating the recitative secco (that is, against the backdrop of sustained cymbal chords).
In 1815, R., passionate about national liberation. ideas, wrote, at the request of the patriots of Bologna, the “Hymn of Independence” (first used under his leadership). After R.'s participation in the patriotic. Austrian demonstrations The police established secret surveillance over him, which lasted for many years. years.
In 1816, in 19-20 days, R. created his best work, an Italian masterpiece. opera buffa - “The Barber of Seville” (based on the comedy by Beaumarchais; in order to avoid parallelism with G. Paisiello’s opera on the same plot, R.’s opera was called “Almaviva, or Vain Precaution”). Due to lack of time, R. used the overture to his opera “Aurelian in Palmyra”. In "The Barber of Seville" he relied on musical and dramatic writing. discoveries of W. A. ​​Mozart and the best Italian. buffoonish traditions. In this op. everything innovative and bright that R. found in his previous comics was combined. operas The characters have rich, multifaceted characteristics, the music sensitively follows the unexpected turns of the action. The richness and flexibility of the wok is amazing. melody, sometimes lyrically cantilena, sometimes generalizing intonation of temperamental Italian. speech. Numerous and diverse ensembles are the focus of musical drama. actions. Even in previous op. R. updated and enriched the art of orchestration. The score of “The Barber of Seville” is evidence of R.’s high achievements in the field of orchestra: sparkling and melodious, timbre-rich and contrasting, loud and transparent. R. brought to perfection the technique of enormous emotional-dynamic, which he had previously encountered. growth achieved by gradually increasing the strength of sonority, connecting new singers. voices and instruments (in particular drums), general acceleration of tempo, rhythmic. injection. R. introduced a similar crescendo at the end of certain arias, ensembles, and always at the conclusion of operatic finales. "The Barber of Seville" is truly realistic. music comedy with elements of satire. Its heroes are endowed with typical characters snatched from life. The situations, for all the clutter of comedic situations and bright theatricality, are natural and truthful. At the premiere, due to the machinations of intriguers and envious people, the opera failed, but the very next performance turned out to be triumphant.

Musical encyclopedia. - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia, Soviet composer. Ed. Yu. V. Keldysh. 1973-1982 .