Alessandro Rolla (1757-1841)
- Concerto per corno di bassetto (c.1820), BI 528
Performers: Paul Meyer (corno di bassetto); I Solisti Veneti; Claudio Scimone (1934-2018, conductor)
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Italian composer, violinist and viola player. He studied counterpoint in
Milan with G.A. Fioroni, a pupil of Leonardo Leo. Having decided to
devote himself to the viola, he performed a viola concerto of his own in
the church of S Ambrogio at some time between 1772 and 1774, probably
under the direction of G.B. Sammartini, and in 1778 he played the viola
in the orchestra for the inauguration of the Regio Ducal Teatro alla
Scala. In 1782, possibly thanks to Sarti, he was appointed first viola
player in the Parma orchestra, becoming its leader and conductor in
1792. In 1802, on the death of the Duke of Parma, he was summoned by the
impresario Ricci to conduct the La Scala orchestra, where he remained
until 1833, directing operas by Mozart, Mayr, Paer, Rossini, Bellini,
the young Donizetti and Mercadante. He also served as first violinist
and conductor of the court orchestra of Viceroy Eugenio di Beauharnais
from 1805, and from 1808 to 1835 he was first professor of violin and
viola at the newly opened Milan Conservatory. Rolla's conducting style
was described by some of his contemporaries: Spohr (1860-61) praised his
‘force and precision’, while Stendhal (1816) mentioned that Rolla
lacked ‘brio in the virtuoso pieces’; similarly the journal I teatri
(1828), having defined him as ‘supreme in controlling orchestras’,
attributed to him ‘a certain predilection for the old style and old
music’. It is safe to say that the widely praised string sound of the La
Scala orchestra in the period of Bellini and Donizetti was the fruit of
Rolla's school. Many young musicians who went on to become famous had
connections with him: Paganini played for Rolla in 1795 and later gave
concerts with him (many of them in 1813-14) and remained a close friend,
and in 1832 Verdi consulted Rolla when looking for a private teacher in
Milan. Continuing the northern Italian tradition of Sammartini and
others, Rolla was very active in the field of instrumental music. In
1813 he performed excerpts from Beethoven's Prometheus music at La Scala
and gave private performances of Beethoven's fourth, fifth and sixth
symphonies in Milan, and in 1823 he gave the first public performance of
a Beethoven symphony at La Scala. After retiring from the conservatory
he began private performances of chamber music in his own home; here too
he was a pioneer in his emphasis on Beethoven. One of those involved,
from 1840 onwards, was the young Antonio Bazzini, later the leading
Beethoven interpreter in Italy.
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