BOSSI, MARCO ENRICO. - Organist and composer, b. at Salò on 25 April 1861; d. on board ship on 20 February 1925, while returning from America.
His father Pietro, a good organist, instructed him in the elements of the musical art. In 1861 he joined his brother Adolfo in Bologna, where he attended the music lyceum and, in 1873, enrolled at the one in Milan. In the autumn of 1878, he took part as pianist and composer in the concerts at the Crystal Palace in London. Having returned to his homeland, he won the competition for organist of the cathedral of Como, and in the Gazzetta musicale di Milano he began a series of articles in which he advocated the necessity of a reform in the study of the organ, whose state of inferiority he pointed out amid the progress of the reform of sacred music. With a great number of highly appreciated organ concerts in Italy and abroad he showed the way to be followed. In 1890 he assumed the chair of organ and harmony at the conservatory of Naples; from 1895 to 1902 he held the direction of the music lyceum of Venice, teaching organ and composition; in that same year he succeeded Martucci in the direction of the music lyceum of Bologna, where he taught advanced composition, and founded and directed the P. Martini Choral Society. In 1911 he left the music lyceum of Bologna to devote himself exclusively to composition and organ concerts; in 1916 he was appointed director of the conservatory of S. Cecilia in Rome, a post he held until 1920.
His activity as an organist was extraordinary and won him high international fame. As a composer he first attempted the theatre, but soon abandoned this genre to devote himself to symphonic music, and with various works of grand style he made his worth as a composer known to the world. The Cantico dei Cantici (Leipzig 1900) and Il Paradiso perduto (Augsburg 1903) rank among his compositions of greatest scale and had highly admired repeated performances. Giovanna d'Arco (mystery in the form of a symphonic poem) on verses by L. Orsini in a prologue and three parts was performed at Cologne on 20 January 1914 and repeated at Turin, Berlin, New York, Rome. His compositions for organ occupy a very important part of the modern repertoire and many of them are often included in the programs of organ concerts: two Sonatas in D and in F, two Scherzos in G min. and in F, Tema e variazioni, Studio sinfonico, Scene pastorali, Pezzo eroico, Legenda, Alleluja, Momenti francescani, etc. For the teaching of the organ he wrote a theoretical-practical method in collaboration with G. Tebaldini. For organ and orchestra he wrote: Concerto in A min., Pezzo da concerto, Fantasia sinfonica, etc. Many are his compositions for liturgical use: Masses, motets, hymns, etc., which gave a notable contribution to the progress of the reform of sacred music.
Bibliography3 works
Alessandro Santini