Gian Francesco Malipiero

Gian Francesco Malipiero, Italian composer and teacher, was the son of Luigi (1853-1918), pianist and conductor, and grandson of composer Francesco Malipiero (1824-1887). After the separation of his parents in 1893, he accompanied his father to Trieste, Berlin, and eventually Wien, where he studied at the conservatory before he returned to Venezia and his mother in 1899. At the Liceo Musicale Benedetto Marcello, Gian Francesco studied composition with Marco Bossi. When Bossi was transferred to Bologna, Malipiero continued his studies essentially self-taught. In 1904 he followed Bossi to make his diploma in Bologna.

In Berlin and Paris, Malipiero came into contact with the contemporary music of Impressionism, and in Italy he joined other composers in the renewal of musical culture. Malipiero lived in Asolo near Venezia until he was forced to take refuge in Roma due to the hostile actions of the Battle of Caporetto in 1917. From 1921 to 1924 he was a composition teacher at the Parma Conservatory and subsequently at the Liceo Musicale Benedetto Marcello, where he was appointed director when it became a conservatory. He retired in 1952.

His musical production made him one of the architects of modern Italian music, combining a renewal of European music with the recovery of the ancient tradition of Italian Baroque. In addition to many symphonic and chamber compositions, oratories, his works include numerous operas, generally based on his own libretto, except of the Sogno di un tramonto d’autunno (Dream of an Autumn Sunset) based on a text by Gabriele D’Annunzio, and a collaboration with the 1934 Nobel Prize Luigi Pirandello.

Malipiero also published the complete edition of Claudio Monteverdi’s works, as well as many works by Antonio Vivaldi and numerous other Italian composers of the 17th and 18th centuries. In 1949, he became a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters in New York.