Vintage Italian postcard, 1930s. B.F.F. Edit. (Ballerini & Fratini, Firenze), No. 785.
Ottorino Respighi, born in Bologna on 9 July 1879 and died in Rome on 18 April 1936, was an Italian composer, musicologist and conductor.
Born in Bologna, Ottorino Respighi received his first violin and piano lessons from his father Giuseppe, a local piano teacher. Ottorino went on to study violin with Federico Sarti at the Bologna Music High School, and composition with Giuseppe Martucci and Luigi Torchi. Respighi then studied composition briefly with Rimsky-Korsakov in Russia, which had a major influence on his work. He also took composition lessons from Max Bruch, although others contest this. In 1905, Respighi completed his first opera, the comedy Re Enzo, followed by e.g. .Semirâma (1910), La bella addormentata nel bosco (1922), Belfagor (1922), La fiamma (1934), and his last opera, Lucrezia Borgia (1938). Yet, in the public mind Respighi has remained better known for two of his orchestral works, Fontane di Roma (1916) and Pini di Roma (1924), both split up in four parts that accentuate the locations and their respective atmospheres in and around Rome. Respighi composed a much lesser known third part as well, Feste di Roma (1928).
In 1919 Respighi married one of his former students, the singer Elsa Olivieri-Sangiacomo. He died of endocarditis at the age of 56 at his home I Pini, "The Pines" in via della Camilluccia. He was buried in the monumental cemetery of the Carthusian monastery in Bologna.
(Source: French Wikipedia)
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