Don Giovanni (1787)
Giuseppe Gazzaniga (1743-1818) was born in Verona and was originally intended by his father for the priesthood. He studied music in Venice and at the conservatory in Naples, becoming a pupil of the successful operatic composer Piccinni. Although his first opera was for Naples, he returned to Venice and produced a number of works, mostly in the popular genre of opera buffa (a total of at least 40) for cities in northern and central Italy. He was also well-known in Dresden and Vienna where several of his operas were produced between 1774 and 1795, including Il finto cieco, (1786) to a libretto by da Ponte. Four years after the great success of his Don Giovanni, Gazzaniga became maestro di capella at Crema Cathedral, and turned mostly to the composition of sacred works. His works are now almost entirely forgotten (although Don Giovanni demonstrates the unjustness of this obscurity), as are those by his contemporaries Paisiello and Cimarosa, a group whose lyrical but straightforward classicism was to be eclipsed by the more complex work of Rossini and the subsequent bel canto tradition.
Press
Financial Times September 2004
Opera magazine November 2004
Opera Japonica October 2004
Musical Opinion November 2004
