Vaccai, Nicola (1790–1848)

Italian composer. Of his 17 operas, only two were successful: Zadig ed Astartea and Giulietta e Romeo (both 1825). He taught singing and was director of the Milan Conservatory 1838–44. In 1832 he published a well-known singing tutor, Metodo pratico di cento italiano per camera.

Vaccai went to school at Pesaro, then studied law in Rome, but at the age of 17 or 18 gave it up for music and studied counterpoint with Giuseppe Jannaconi (also known as Giannacconi or Jannacconi; c. 1740–1816). In 1811 he studied with Giovanni Paisiello at Naples and in 1815 produced his first opera there. He then lived at Venice for seven years, produced two operas there, afterwards taught singing at Trieste and Vienna, in 1824 produced two operas at Parma and Turin and in 1825 had his greatest success, at Milan, with Giuletta e Romeo, after Shakespeare. In 1829–31 he lived in Paris and afterwards briefly in London, which he visited again 1833–34. In 1838 he succeeded Francesco Basili as director of the Milan Conservatory, retiring to Pesaro in 1844.

Works Opera I solitari di Scozia (1815), Pietro il grande (1824), La pastorella feudataria, Giulietta e Romeo (1825), Marco Visconti (1838), Giovanna Grey (1836), Virginia, Giovanna d'Arco (1827), La sposa di Messina (both after Schiller), and others.

Sacred and secular music church music; cantata on the death of Malibran and others; Ariette per camera for voice and piano.