Azio Corghi

Azio Corghi (9 March 1937 – 17 November 2022) was an Italian composer, academic teacher and musicologist.

He composed mostly operas and chamber music.

His operas are often based on literature, especially in collaboration with José Saramago as librettist.

Born in Cirié, in the Province of Turin, on 9 March 1937, Corghi was interested in both painting and music.

His first instrument was an accordion.

From 1956, he studied the piano at the Turin Conservatory with Mario Zanfi.

After graduation in 1962, he moved to the Milan Conservatory, where he studied composition with Bruno Bettinelli, choral music with Amerigo Bortone, conducting with Antonino Votto, and polyphonic vocal composition with Guido Farina (composer).

Corghi's orchestral composition Intavolature, performed at La Fenice in Venice, won the Ricordi composition competition of 1967.

Corghi began teaching at the Turin Conservatory that year.

Later he also taught at the Milan and Parma conservatories, the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, the Perosi Academy in Biella, and the Accademia Filarmonica di Bologna.

Corghi held the chair in composition at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome and had many famous students, including Silvia Colasanti, Ludovico Einaudi, and Fabio Mengozzi.

His first opera, Gargantua, was premiered at the Teatro Regio in Turin in 1984, his second opera, Blimunda, was first performed at La Scala in Milan in the 1989/90 season, and his third opera, Divara – aqua e sangue, was premiered in 1993 at the Theater Münster, Germany.

He taught composition at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, among other academies.

His own first opera Gargantua, after Rabelais' novel Gargantua and Pantagruel, received its premiere at the Teatro Regio in 1984 conducted by Donato Renzetti.

He composed his second opera, Blimunda to a libretto by José Saramago who became his longtime friend and collaborator.

It was first performed at La Scala in Milan in the 1989/90 season, directed by Jérôme Savary and conducted by Zoltán Peskó.

He was awarded the Massimo Mila Award in 1991 for his dedication to teaching.

Casa Ricordi entrusted Corghi with the preparation of a critical edition of Rossini's opera L'italiana in Algeri for a production at the Pesaro Festival which gave him insight in the construction of operas.

When Rossini's bicentenary was celebrated in 1992, Corghi composed the Suite dodo, based on some of Rossini's Péchés de vieillesse, and his ballet Un petit train de plaisir was performed at the Teatro Rossini in Pesaro, broadcast live.

The author, who would be awarded the Nobel Prize in 1998, and the composer worked together again on Divara – aqua e sangue, which was premiered at the Theater Münster, in German, on 31 October 1993.

This production was recorded.

He wrote a concert etude, ... ça ira! in 1997 for the Umberto Micheli International Piano Competition.

The same year, he transcribed ariettas from Nuits d'été à Pausilippe for the bicentenary of Gaetano Donizetti.

In 1999, Corghi was commissioned to compose an opera for La Scala, Tat'jana, based on Chekhov's play Tatyana Repina.

It was premiered in 2000, directed by Peter Stein and conducted by Will Humburg.

In 2000 he completed Amori incrociati after Aldo Busi's version of The Decameron, to be played by the RAI National Symphony Orchestra.

In 2001 he composed Cruci-Verba, again for Münster, which combined readings from and comment on Saramago's The Gospel According to Jesus Christ; it was combined with Liszt's Via crucis.

In 2001 Corghi wrote … malinconia, ninfa gentil for the bicentenary of Vincenzo Bellini.

In 2002, he wrote the opera Senja for Münster, based on Chekhov's On the High Road.

De paz e de guerra was another collaboration with Saramago, in 2002.

He composed in 2002, on a commission from the Santa Cecilia National Academy, De paz e de guerra to a libretto by Saramago.

On 8 July 2004, he performed ¿Pia?, a music-and-drama dialogue inspired by Marguerite Yourcenar's Le Dialogue dans le Marécage at the Teatro dei Rozzi in Siena, commissioned by the Chigiana Music Academy.

In 2005, he was awarded the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic.

In 2005, Corghi composed Il dissoluto assolto, a musical in one act to a libretto by the composer and Saramago, which was co-produced by La Scala and Teatro San Carlos in Lisbon.

It was directed by Patrizia Frini and conducted by Marko Letonja.

He wrote Poema Sinfonico for the 25th anniversary of La Scala Philharmonic Orchestra, first performed on 29 January 2007 at La Scala conducted by Riccardo Chailly.

Corghi was married to Magda Bodrito who had a degree in literature.

The couple had two children.

He was commissioned in 2008 by Ensemble Punto to compose the opera Giocasta to celebrate the quincentenary of Andrea Palladio, to a libretto by Maddalena Mazzocut-Mis based on Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, because an opera with the subject by Andrea Gabrieli was performed when Palladio's Teatro Olimpico was opened in 1585; Giocasta was performed there on 19 June 2009.

For the bicentenary of Verdi in 2013, he wrote Madreterra, a sacred dialogue between Verdi and Pasolini, which was performed at the Teatro Regio in Parma on 9 October 2013.