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Giovanni Pacini
February 17, 1796 - December 6, 1867
born in Catania, Italy, composed during the Romantic period
Biography
If it weren't for a period in 1840-1845 when he rose to the top of the heap, then Italian composer Giovanni Pacini would be remembered as an also-ran opera composer from the time of Giacchino Rossini, Bellini, and Donizetti. Born to an operatic tenor, Pacini was placed on a path that would have led him to the service of sacred music and studied composition in Bologna from the tender age of 12. However, he composed his first opera at age 17 and the second, Annetta e Lucindo, was heard in Milan in October 1813. These early efforts proved the first rivulets of an eventual flood of opera from Pacini's pen; by the time he finally laid it down 54 years later, Pacini had composed more than 80 of them.

Before 1820 Pacini primarily composed comic operas, but began to experiment with opera seria from about 1817 and after 1821 produced only the latter until the end. When his rival and idol Rossini dropped out of the Neapolitan theater in 1822, Pacini replaced him and enjoyed a taste of success with the serious operas Alessandro 'nell Indie (1824) and L'Ultimo Giorno di Pompei (1825). Nonetheless, by 1830, Pacini began to feel the heat of competition from Bellini and Donizetti and after a long string of failures he retired from opera to pursue the sacred composition he'd abandoned in his youth.