Ferdinando Giorgetti

Ferdinando Giorgetti (Florence, Italy, 23 June 1796 – Florence, Italy, 23 March 1867) was a composer, violinist, educator and Italian publicist.

Giorgetti, a child prodigy, started studying violin with Giovanni Francesco Giuliani at five years old and continued on this path for 9 years. However, nothing is known regarding his education of composition, so it is most probable that he was self-taught. The publications from that time mention him as the private violin instructor of Carlo II of Borbone-Parma, but no specific dates are given. Rumors originate from the fact that Giorgetti, in 1840, dedicated a complex sacred oratorio for choir and a large orchestra, Le turbe nel deserto, to Carlo II. The frontispiece of the autograph (today found in Parma, see Sources) affirm being given to the prince «i primi elementi di musica e restommi scolpito mai sempre nel cuore» («I gave the Prince his first education in music, and he remained struck in my heart»). Research into the lives of both of them indicates that it is probable that the dates of their lessons were 1808, so, if this is in fact true, twelve-year-old Giorgetti taught the 9-year-old prince.

In 1811, Elisa Bonaparte hired him as her personal violinist («Chamber Violin of the Queen of Etruria»), and he traveled with her in Spain and France until 1814, the year in which two central occurrences took place in his life: the fall of Napoleon and the contraction of a mysterious disease affecting his nervous system which left him paralyzed from the hips down. Because of the loss of his job, and above all, his paralysis, he was forced to leave his career as a soloist and dedicate his efforts to composition, teaching, musical publicity, and the organization of events and performances.

It was from that moment in his life that he perfected counterpoint with Disma Ugolini (1755-1828)[1], learning the methods in practice, derived from the experienced didactics of Antonin Reicha, who was a classmate of Beethoven and teacher of not only Ugolini, but also Franck, Adam, Berlioz and Liszt. In 1817, despite his paralysis, he traveled to Germany to publish his compositions in Leipzig, at Breitkopf & Härtel publishers (their relation lasted until 1825). In 1818, he composed a concerto for flute, extraordinarily and curiously similar to the second concerto that Saverio Mercadante wrote for the same instrument in 1819. In 1825, he won (tied with Luigi Ferdinando Casamorata) a competition by the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze centered around the putting to music of the cantata Il Ciclope by Pietro Metastasio.

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