Vittorio Gui

Vittorio Gui was born in Rome in September 1885, the son of an academic. He studied piano and composition at the Liceo Musicale di Santa Cecilia in Rome and made his conducting début in 1907 at the Teatro Adriano with *La Gioconda*. He held posts at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples from 1916, La Scala from 1923, and the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino from its founding in 1933 — the festival he helped establish as the leading Italian summer music event of the inter-war period.

His international career took shape in the 1930s and 1940s, with regular guest engagements at the Salzburg Festival, the Concertgebouw and the Vienna Philharmonic. His long association with Glyndebourne began in 1952 and lasted until his retirement in 1965; he was the festival’s musical director from 1952 to 1964, and was particularly responsible for the post-war revival of the Rossini opera buffa tradition — *Il barbiere di Siviglia*, *La Cenerentola*, *Le comte Ory*, *L’italiana in Algeri* — with productions and recordings that remained reference performances for the following generation. He also composed: an opera, *La fata Malerba*, and various orchestral and chamber pieces.

Gui was awarded honorary degrees by Oxford and the Royal Academy of Music, and was made Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1959. He died in Florence in October 1975. Music Preserved’s archive includes a substantial range of his work at Glyndebourne and elsewhere.