Tito Gotti

Tito Gotti (6 July 1927, Bologna — 11 May 2024, Ibid.) was a prominent Italian conductor, musicologist, essayist, and events organizer. He is best known as the founder of the avant-garde festival, Feste Musicali (1967–2003), and served as the chair of Choral Music & Direction at Conservatorio "G.B. Martini" di Bologna (1962 to 1998) and the conductor of the Orchestra Del Teatro Comunale Di Bologna. Gotti graduated from the Bologna Conservatory after studying composition and choral music under Adone Zecchi; he learned piano with Giuseppe Piccioli and further studied conducting with Hans Swarowsky, Franco Ferrara, and Lovro Von Matacic. Over the years, Tito combined a prolific stage career with academic research, performing a broad symphonic and operatic repertoire in Italy and abroad while writing on various topics, such as the XVII-XVIII-century music of Bologna and Emilia. In 1967, Tito Gotti launched an experimental music festival at Teatro Comunale di Bologna. In June 1978, Gotti joined forces with composers Walter Marchetti and Juan Hidalgo to commission John Cage for a unique musical happening on a moving train, where performers traveled with the audience and engaged in curated activities at each station. Other participants included sound engineer Oderso Rubini, who prepared field recordings from various towns and villages on the route, as well as Demetrio Stratos and Daniel Charles. The Cage's Train drew worldwide attention to Festi Musicali a Bologna, which subsequently branched out as an independent organization and partnered with many notable institutions and events, including Teatro alla Scala, Milano, Salzburger Festspiele, Autunno Musicale Di Como, Ravenna Festival, and Rossini Opera Festival. Gotti directed 31 editions, featuring prominent European composers and performers, from Karlheinz Stockhausen and Bruno Maderna to Severino Gazzelloni and Salvatore Accardo, until his retirement in 2003. In October 2022, Alliance Française Bologna paid homage to Tito Gotti and his wife, Brigitte Pasquet-Gotti, with a concert of two works composed by Gilberto Cappelli, Tito's pupil, and performed by violinist Elicia Silverstein and cellist Sebastiano Severi.