Pietro Mascagni

A one-act competition announced by the publisher Sonzogno changed Mascagni's life at twenty-six: Cavalleria rusticana, drawn from Verga's Sicilian story of jealousy and honour, won it and was staged in Rome in May 1890 with a success that made a career and then stood in front of it. He was a baker's son from Livorno who had studied with Alfredo Soffredini against his father's wish for a legal career, entered the Milan Conservatory — Puccini was a contemporary there — left before finishing, and was conducting operetta in provincial theatres when the prize came. More than a dozen operas followed. L'amico Fritz turned to warmth and understatement, Iris to a Japanese subject and an orchestral palette of unusual delicacy, Isabeau and Il piccolo Marat to something harder-edged; together they show a far wider range than the one-work reputation allows. He conducted throughout his life and directed the Rossini conservatory at Pesaro from 1895. He died in Rome in 1945. Before the prize he was director of music and singing to the new philharmonic society at Cerignola, and Cavalleria rusticana was finished there in May 1889 and staged at the Teatro Costanzi a year later; Mahler conducted it in Budapest that December. L'amico Fritz followed at the same theatre in October 1891, Le maschere failed in 1901, Amica came in 1905 and Nerone, the last of his fifteen operas, was given in 1935. He died on 2 August 1945.