Gioacchino Rossini, an Italian composer, born in Pesaro, Feb. 29, 1792, died in Paris, Nov. 13, 1868. His parents were members of a strolling operatic company, and at 10 years of age he played the second horn in the orchestra, his father playing the first. Soon afterward he was placed with Angelo Tesei, a music teacher in Bologna, under whose instructions he developed a soprano voice of great purity and compass; and at 14 he was able to sing at sight any piece of music placed before him. After being for several years a chorister in the Bo-lognese churches, and occasionally chorus master in provincial theatres, he was induced in 1807 by the breaking of his voice to enter the lyceum of Bologna, where he was instructed in counterpoint by the abbate Mattei. Hearing his master say that simple counterpoint would suffice for ordinary stage composition, he left the school, studied the works of the principal opera writers, giving especial attention to Mozart, and at 18 years of age, having tried his hand at some minor pieces, produced his first dramatic work, La cambiale di ma-trimonio, an operetta performed with moderate success at the theatre San Mosè in Venice. His Demetrio e Polibio, produced in Rome in 1811, is said to have been written two years earlier.

In 1812 he composed five operas, all of which, with the exception of L'Inganno felice, speedily sank into oblivion. In the succeeding year he appeared before the Venetians with three operas, one of which, Tancredi, excited an enthusiasm almost without a parallel in the history of music, and within three years found its way into every musical theatre of Europe and America. Of the remaining operas composed in 1813, L'ltaliana in Algieri was almost equally successful, and with Tancredi still holds possession of the stage. In the following year he produced at Milan Aureliano in Palmira and Il Turco in Italia, the latter of which is still frequently performed; and in 1815 Elisabetta regina d'Inghilterra for the San Carlo theatre of Naples, where he also accepted an engagement as musical director. In 1816 his Barbiere di Siviglia, probably the most admirable specimen of the Italian opera buffa in existence, was performed in Rome during the carnival with a success which, after the lapse of more than half a century, has suffered no diminution. According to Manuel Garcia, for whom the Barbiere was written, the greater part of it was composed in eight days.

In 1816-17 he composed for the San Carlo and other theatres seven or more operas, three of which, Otello, La Cenerentola, and La gazza ladra, are yet standard favorites - the first a striking example of his forcible style, and the second of his skill in producing florid embellishments. His Mosè in Egitto (1818) ranks among the author's finest serious compositions. Within the next few years were produced La donna del lago, Maometto Secondo, Zelmira, and a number of minor works, showing a gradual increase of power in harmony and instrumental effects, with no loss of melodic beauty. In 1821 he married Mlle. Colbran, prima donna at the San Carlo, for whom many of his parts were written. With her he went the same year to Vienna to direct the production of his Zelmira, in which his wife took part. Returning to Venice in 1823, he took leave of the Italian stage with the opera Semiramide, the most elaborate of his works up to that period. In 1824 he visited London with his wife under an engagement to compose an opera for the king's theatre. An indolent carelessness now took the place of his former activity, he neglected his duties, failed to produce his promised opera, and made the season ruinous to the lessees of the theatre.

But his visit was profitable to himself, and he left England with £10,000, derived principally from concerts arranged for him by the leaders of fashionable society at enormous prices of admission. Going to Paris, he accepted the post of director of the Italian opera, an office which he held till 1830, with little increase of professional celebrity, but with considerable profit. For three years he composed nothing new except a slight piece called Il viaggio a Rheims, a portion of which was reproduced in a graceful French opera entitled Le comte Ory; but several of his former works were brought out with success, including his Maometto under the title of Le siége de Corinthe. In 1829 he produced Guillaume Tell, generally considered his masterpiece in serious composition, a work abounding in beautiful melodies and in rich and varied instrumentation, but so different in style from any of his previous operas that it seems the creation of another mind. With this work, at the age of 37 and in the prime of his powers, he voluntarily closed his career as a dramatic composer; and for many years he wrote nothing with the exception of his Stabat Mater, a pleasing composition, but rather operatic than ecclesiastical.

During his residence in Paris he was appointed by Charles X. inspector general of singing, with a liberal salary, from the enjoyment of which he was cut off by the revolution of 1830. He still remained several years in Paris, claiming compensation for losses he had sustained, and in 1836 retired to an elegant villa near Bologna, where for nearly 20 years he principally resided, refusing the most tempting offers to write for the stage, on the ground that he was unwilling to endanger his reputation by the production of inferior works. Disturbed by the revolutionary excitements of 1848, he retired to Florence, but in 1855 returned to Paris, where he chiefly resided till his death. During this interval he composed but one work of importance, his Messe solennelle, which he wrote in 1863 and scored for orchestra in 1865. It was first performed at the Théâtre Italien in Paris, Feb. 28, 1869. He was buried in Père Lachaise. He left a widow, his second wife. His operas number about 40. He also wrote cantatas, hymns, and miscellaneous vocal and instrumental pieces.

A number of his posthumous pianoforte compositions were sold in 1873 by his widow to Baron Grant, who proposes to publish them in England and to devote the proceeds to the establishment of a prize at the musical academy in London. His larger dramatic compositions, on which his fame chiefly rests, illustrate the richness and variety of his melodic invention, his consummate skill in writing for the voice, and the intimate and natural association of florid ornament with the body of the music, which constitutes his peculiar style. - Many biographies of Rossini have been written, among them the following: Rossini e la sua musica, by Bettoni (Milan, 1824); Vie de Rossini, by Beyle, under the nom de plume of Stendhal (Paris, 1823-'4); Rossini, sa vie et ses oeuvres, by Azevedo (Paris, 1865); "Life of Rossini," by Edwards (London, 1869); Della vita e delle opere di Gioacchino Rossini, by Silvestri (Milan, 1875); and a life by A. Ganolini (Bologna, 1875).