Arrigo Pedrollo (5 December 1878 in

Montebello Vicentino Montebello Vicentino is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Vicenza, Veneto, northern Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian P ...

– 23 December 1964 in

Vicenza Vicenza ( , ; or , archaically ) is a city in northeastern Italy. It is in the Veneto region, at the northern base of the Monte Berico, where it straddles the Bacchiglione, River Bacchiglione. Vicenza is approximately west of Venice and e ...

) was an Italian composer. His father was his first teacher; at thirteen he went to study at the

Milan Conservatory The Milan Conservatory, also known as the Conservatorio di Milano and the Conservatorio Giuseppe Verdi, is a Music school, college of music in Milan, Italy. History The conservatory was established by a royal decree of 1807 in Milan, capital ...

. Among his teachers there was

Gaetano Coronaro Gaetano Coronaro (18 December 1852 – 5 April 1908) was an Italian conductor, pedagogue, and composer. He was born in Vicenza and had his initial musical training there followed by study from 1871 to 1873 at the Milan Conservatory under Franco Fa ...

. At his graduation in 1900, Pedrollo's only

symphony A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, most often for orchestra. Although the term has had many meanings from its origins in the ancient Greek era, by the late 18th century the word had taken on the meaning c ...

was performed, under the direction of

Arturo Toscanini Arturo Toscanini (; ; March 25, 1867January 16, 1957) was an Italian conductor. He was one of the most acclaimed and influential musicians of the late 19th and early 20th century, renowned for his intensity, his perfectionism, his ear for orche ...

. He chose instead to compose operas in a

Wagnerian Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( ; ; 22 May 181313 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, essayist, and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his mature works were later known, "music dramas"). Unlike most ...

cast; in 1908 his first, ''Terra promessa'', was premiered in

Cremona Cremona ( , , ; ; ) is a city and (municipality) in northern Italy, situated in Lombardy, on the left bank of the Po (river), Po river in the middle of the Po Valley. It is the capital of the province of Cremona and the seat of the local city a ...

. His second, ''Juana'', won the 1949 Sonzogno Prize. Between 1920 and 1936 six more of his operas saw their premieres. In 1922 he became the head of the Conservatory in Vicenza. In 1930 he returned to Milan to teach composition at the Conservatory there; he held that post until 1941. Pedrollo retired at eighty-five, five years before his death.

References

*"Arrigo Pedrollo". In David Mason Greene, ''Biographical Dictionary of Composers''. Garden City, New York; Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1985. 1878 births 1964 deaths Italian classical composers Italian opera composers Italian male opera composers People from the Province of Vicenza Milan Conservatory alumni Academic staff of Milan Conservatory {{Italy-composer-stub