Rossiniana
Encyclopedia
Rossiniana, P. 148, is a 1925 orchestral suite by Ottorino Respighi
Ottorino Respighi
Ottorino Respighi was an Italian composer, musicologist and conductor. He is best known for his orchestral "Roman trilogy": Fountains of Rome ; Pines of Rome ; and Roman Festivals...

, based on four piano pieces by Gioachino Rossini.

Respighi had written the ballet La Boutique fantasque
La Boutique fantasque
La Boutique fantasque or The Magic Toy Shop was a ballet conceived by Léonide Massine who wrote the choreography and the libretto. Ottorino Respighi wrote the music based on piano pieces by Gioachino Rossini. Its world premiere was at the Alhambra Theatre in London on 5 June 1919 and was performed...

for Léonide Massine in 1919, basing it on short piano pieces by Rossini, from his collection Péchés de vieillesse
Péchés de vieillesse
In Gioachino Rossini's Péchés de vieillesse , the opera composer gathered together 150 vocal and solo piano pieces into fourteen unpublished albums, under his self-deprecating and ironic title. The grouping of pieces in albums do not reflect the sequence or the dates of their composition, which...

(Sins of Old Age). In 1925, he returned to Rossini's music, but not as a ballet, simply as concert music. He again used Sins of Old Age, specifically Quelques riens (Various nothings) from Volume XII, and applied what he called a trascrizione libera (free transcription) to them.

The four movements are:
  • "Capri e Taormina (Barcarola e Siciliana)"
  • "Lamento"
  • "Intermezzo"
  • "Tarantella 'puro sangue' (con passaggio de la Processione)”.


The scoring is brilliant, but also dark and evocative. Although not written for the ballet, Rossiniana is eminently suitable for use in ballet. It has been choreographed, and the music has been recorded as "Rossiniana (ballet music)". It has also received other recordings without any reference to ballet.

Sources

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