Life
Trained in the heart of the Fin de siècle, an era of extraordinary complexity in which Verismo, Decadentism, and Symbolism coexisted, while his long mature career took place in a 20th century marked by the revolution of Futurism and subsequent currents.
Alfredo Cairati, musician, composer, and conductor, was born in Milan into a family of artists; his father was the musician and conductor Giuseppe Cairati and his mother the opera singer Ernesta Maj. His training was thorough and rigorous: he studied piano and conducting at the Royal Conservatory of Milan with Carlo Andreoli and Giuseppe Frugatta, and composition with Giuseppe Bazzini. Subsequently, he perfected his studies at the Royal Academy of Music in Munich with Josef Rheinberger.
Initially, he established himself as a conductor in Milan, but later moved to Berlin, where he worked as a composer and, above all, as a singing teacher at the Stern Conservatory from 1908 to 1916. During his teaching career, he trained numerous students, many of whom became successful opera singers. Later, he settled in Zurich, where he founded the Academy of Singing and the Madrigal Choir, an ensemble with which he dedicated himself to the rediscovery and performance of Italian works from the 17th and 18th centuries. His dedication to teaching also led him to hold the position of singing teacher and choir director at the Hochschule für Musik in Stuttgart.
Aneddoto
A family of artists
Coming from a family of musicians, with a conductor father and an opera singer mother, Alfredo Cairati not only inherited talent but also passed it on to his daughter Giuseppina, herself a musician, and to his nephew Vittorio Raschèr, who became a noted Romanist, philologist, and conductor.Works
Alfredo Cairati's production was primarily oriented toward dramatic music and vocal works. Among his most significant musical dramas are Giorgione (an opera in three acts), the operetta Der Affenpavillon, Der erste Frack (an operatic idyll), the musical fantasy Storiella del parco di Lorch, and the lyric fantasy Un sogno.
Regarding vocal music, he composed pieces such as Ave Maria, Barcarole, La madre di Gesù, and Weihnachtslied, in addition to song cycles like Galgenlieder. He also composed instrumental music, including a chamber suite and fantasies like La divina commedia. Furthermore, he dedicated himself to arrangements of works by other composers, including Amarilli by Giulio Caccini, Per questa bella mano by Mozart, and La Bohème by Ruggero Leoncavallo, demonstrating remarkable versatility and a deep respect for the Italian and European musical tradition.
Briciole di storia
Pellizza da Volpedo and the Fiumana That Would Become The Fourth Estate
In his studio in Volpedo, the painter Giuseppe Pellizza continued to work obsessively on a large canvas representing the march of the workers. After an initial version titled Ambassadors of Hunger, in 1897 the artist dedicated himself to a new draft, even more monumental, which he called Fiumana. The composition was already defined: a compact crowd advancing toward the viewer, led by three figures. Pellizza was, however, dissatisfied with the technique; he sought a truer, more vibrant light. He continued to study and repaint, rigorously applying the pointillist technique. That Fiumana, so painstakingly elaborated, was not yet the definitive work, but it was the decisive step that, a few years later, would lead him to create his absolute masterpiece: The Fourth Estate.
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