Alessandro Parisotti

Alessandro Parisotti (July 24, 1853 – April 4, 1913) was an Italian composer and music editor.

Life and career

Though also a composer, Alessandro Parisotti is better known today as the original editor of a collection of songs known as arie antiche (originally titled Arie antiche: ad una voce per canto e pianoforte, published 1890). The original collection comprises three volumes of songs or arias published as a primer to study classical singing, but the three volumes have since been reduced to single-volumed extracts known as the 24 Italian Songs and Arias, sometimes also the 26 Italian Songs and Arias.

Parisotti collected these antique arias (arie antiche is the Italian) in what was the 19th century vogue for discovering forgotten old or antique music from the classical and baroque eras. The most famous example of this practice of reclaiming forgotten music is Mendelssohn's revival of Bach's St. Matthew Passion in Leipzig (1829). The taste for rediscovered music was de rigueur among musicians and audiences of the nineteenth century, with composers lesser than Mendelssohn and Brahms playing the field as well. Parisotti found forgotten scores and arranged their arias (or duets) for solo singer and Piano accompaniment.

In his collection, "Se tu m'ami" was attributed to Giovanni Pergolesi where in fact Parisotti composed it himself.^{[citation needed]} Notable students include pianist and composer Lucia Contini Anselmi.

External links

• Short biography^{[dead link]}
• Sheet music for Parisotti's Anthology of Italian Song
• Free scores by Alessandro Parisotti in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki)