Profile
Antonio Vivaldi: The Composer Who Painted the Seasons
Venetian violinist and Baroque composer, born on 4 March 1678
Antonio Vivaldi was born in Venice on 4 March 1678, the son of a barber who was also a skilled violinist. He trained for the priesthood and was ordained, but asthma-like illness meant he soon stopped saying Mass and focused on music instead.
At the Ospedale della Pietà, which cared for orphaned and abandoned girls, he taught violin and wrote hundreds of works for its brilliant orchestra of young women. He composed more than 500 concertos, many for violin, as well as around fifty operas and a large amount of sacred music.
His set of four violin concertos, The Four Seasons, published in 1725, paints birdsong, storms, shivering winters and lazy summer heat in sound. Rediscovered in the twentieth century, his music is now heard everywhere from concert halls to adverts and film soundtracks.
Career highlights
- 1678Born in Venice: son of a violinist father
- 1703Ordained a priest: and joins the Ospedale della Pietà
- 1711L'estro armonico: concerto collection that spreads his fame
- 1713First opera staged: beginning a busy theatre career
- 1725The Four Seasons: published in The Contest Between Harmony and Invention
- 1740Moves to Vienna: seeking new royal patronage
- 1741Dies in Vienna: in poverty, soon largely forgotten
- 1950sRevival: recordings make him a household name again
Did you know?Many of his manuscripts were lost for nearly two centuries until a large collection was rediscovered in the 1920s, helping spark his revival.
