Vincenzo Bellini

From Wind Repertory Project
Vincenzo Bellini

Biography

Vincenzo Bellini (3 November 1801, Catania, Sicily – 23 September 1835, Puteaux, France) was an Italian opera composer.

Born in Catania, at the time part of the Kingdom of Sicily, the eldest of seven children in the family, he became a child prodigy within a highly musical family. His grandfather, Vincenzo Tobia Bellini, had studied at the conservatory in Naples and, in Catania from 1767 forward, had been an organist and teacher, as had Vincenzo's father, Rosario.

An anonymous twelve-page hand-written history, held in Catania's Museo Belliniano, states that Vincenzo could sing an aria by Valentino Fioravanti at eighteen months, that he began studying music theory at two years of age and the piano at three. By the age of five, he could apparently play "marvelously". The document states that Bellini's first five pieces were composed when he was just six years old and "at seven he was taught Latin, modern languages, rhetoric, and philosophy".

After 1816, Bellini began living with his grandfather, from whom he received his first music lessons. Soon after, the young composer began to write compositions. Among them were the nine Versetti da cantarsi il Venerdi Santo, eight of which were based on texts by Metastasio.

The success of his first opera,Adelain e Salvina, in 1825 encouraged him to compose primarily for the stage. Among his more popular operas are Norma, I Puritani, and La Sonnambula. Bellini was the quintessential composer of the Italian bel canto era of the early 19th century


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