ROSSINI, GIOACHINO ANTONIO (1792-1868), Italian operatic composer, was born at Pesaro on Feb. 29, 1792. His father was town trumpeter and inspector of slaughter-houses, his mother a baker's daughter. The elder Rossini was imprisoned by the Austrians in 1796, and the mother took Gioachino to Bologna, earning her living as a prima donna buffa at various theatres of the Romagna, where she was ultimately rejoined by her hus band. Gioachino remained at Bologna in the care of a pork butcher, while his father played the horn in the bands of the theatres at which his mother sang. The boy learned singing and the pianoforte, and at thirteen appeared at the theatre of the Commune in Paer's Camilla—his only appearance as a public singer (18o5). He was also able to play the horn. In 1807 he was admitted to the Conservatorio of Bologna,' but his insight into orchestral resources was gained rather by scoring the quartets and symphonies of Haydn and Mozart, than from his teachers. At Bologna he was known as "il Tedeschino" on account of his devotion to Mozart. His first opera, La Cambiale di Matrimonio, was produced at Venice when he was eighteen. Two years before he had received the prize at the Conservatorio of Bologna for his cantata // pianto d'armonia per la morte d'Orfeo. Between 18io and 1813, at Bologna, Rome, Venice and Milan, Rossini pro duced operas of which the successes were varying. Tancredi, produced at the Fenice, Venice (1813) made him famous. The libretto was an arrangement of Voltaire's tragedy by J. A. Rossi. Traces of Paer and Paisiello were undeniably present in frag ments of the music. But the sweetness and clarity of such melo dies as "Mi rivedrai, ti rivedro" and "Di tanti palpiti," conquered Venice. Italians would sing "Mi rivedrai" in the law courts until called upon by the judge to desist. Rossini continued to write operas for Venice and Milan during the next few years, but without repeating the success of Tancredi.
In 1815 he retired to Bologna, where Barbaja, the impresario of the Naples theatre, engaged him as musical director of the Teatro San Carlo and the Teatro Del Fondo at Naples, on the understanding that he compose for each of them one opera a year. His payment was to be 200 ducats (about £35 or $175) per
month ; he was also to receive a share in the gaming-tables, also owned by Barbaja, amounting to about 1,000 ducats (L175 or $875) per annum. General enthusiasm greeted the court per formance of his Elisabetta regina d' Inghilterra, in which Isabella Colbran, whom Rossini afterwards married, took a leading part. The opera was the first in which Rossini wrote the ornaments of the airs instead of leaving them to the fancy of the singers, and also the first in which the recitativo secco was replaced by a re citative accompanied by a quartet of strings. In Almaviva (Rome, 1816) the libretto, a version of Beaumarchais' Barbier de Seville by Sterbini, was the same as that already used by Paisiello in his Barbiere, an opera which had enjoyed European popularity for more than a quarter of a century. But Rossini had created such a masterpiece of musical comedy that the title of Il Barbiere di Siviglia passed inevitably to his opera.
Between 1815 and 1823 Rossini produced twenty operas. Of these Otello formed the climax, contrasting interestingly with the treatment of the same subject at a similar point of artistic development by Verdi. In deference to the taste of the day the story was made to end happily! The opera Cenerentola (1817) is to be ranked with the Barbiere, as a masterpiece in comedy. Mose in Egitto was produced at Naples in 1818. In 1821, Rossini married Isabella Colbran. In 1822 he directed his Cenerentola in Vienna, where Zelmira was also performed. After this he re turned to Bologna; but an invitation from Prince Metternich to "assist in the general re-establishment of harmony" brought him to Verona at the opening of the Congress on Oct. 20, 1822. Here he made friends with Chateaubriand and Madame de Lieven.