Alessandro Solbiati was born in 1956, in Busto Arsizio, near Milan, and graduated from the Conservatoire of Milan with degrees in piano (under Eli Perrotta) and composition (Sandro Gorli), after studying physics for two years at the University of Milan. At the same time, he attended Franco Donatoni’s advanced composition courses at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena for four years (1977-1980). In addition to several national competitions, Solbiati also won the 1980 International Competition of Turin with Quartetto d’archi and the 1982 RAI-Paganini Competition in Rome with Di luce, for violin and orchestra.
Solbiati has received many commissions from various organizations including the Teatro alla Scala, the Teatro Regio di Torino, the Teatro Verdi di Trieste, the Italian National Radio (RAI), the French Ministry of Culture, Radio France, the University of Paris, the Mozarteum, the South Bank of London, the Gulbenkian Foundation of Lisbon, the Venice Biennale, the Festival MilanoMusica, the Teatro Comunale of Bologna, the San Petronio Basilica of Bologna for the 7th Centenary of its founding, the Symphonic Orchestra “G. Verdi” of Milan, among others. His music has been performed in major international festivals (Lille, Avignon, Huddersfield, Présences ’92, ’94 and ’97, Pontino, Wien Modern, Sydney, Metz, Strasbourg, Venice Biennale ’81, ’85, ’95, 2002 and 2008, Montepulciano, Holland Festival, Zagreb, Lisbon, Stockholm, IRCAM, Santa Cecilia in Rome, Maastricht, Moscow, Boston, Mexico City, RAI (Rome, Milan, Turin and Neaples), Maggio Musicale Fiorentino (Florence), MilanoMusica, Settembre Musica, Unione Musicale, etc.) and has been recorded and broadcasted by many European and American radio stations.
His first opera, Il carro e i canti, on his own libretto from the tragedy The party during the plague by Puškin, commissioned by the “G.Verdi” Theatre of Trieste, has been premiered there on April 2009. The second one, Leggenda, on his own libretto from The legend of the Great Inquisitor (inside Karamazov brothers by Dostoevskij), Commission of Teatro Regio of Turin, will be premiered in September 2011 at the Teatro Carignano of Turin, conducted by Gianandrea Noseda and directed by Stefano Poda.
Among Solbiati’s recorded works one can mention the oratorio Nel deserto (CD ADDA – Ensemble 2E2M), Quartetto con Lied (Quartetto Borciani – Stradivarius), Trio (Trio Matisse – Ermitage); moreover, Stradivarius has released three monographic CD, the first one in 1999 with Solbiati’s chamber music (Mari, Trio d’archi, Am Fuss des Gebirgs, Sonetto, Sonata) played by the Ensemble Alternance of Paris, the second one in 2003, with his chamber pieces with bigger instrumentation (Canto per Ania for cello and 14 instruments, By my window for piano and 9 instruments etc.) played by the Ensemble Orchestral Contemporain de Lyon and Divertimento Ensemble of Milan, and the third one in 2006, with some of his recent orchestral works (Sinfonia seconda, Sinfonia and Die Sterne des Leidlands) conducted by Daniel Kawka with RAI Turin Symphonic Orchestra . For the Italian National Radio (RAI), he produced two radio films, both based on stories by Paola Capriolo: Frammenti da “Il gigante” (1994) and La colomba azzurra (1996). His collaboration with Capriolo has continued in 1997 with a musical production entitled Con i miei mille occhi, based on the long story published by Bompiani (book plus CD). Since 1995 he teaches Fugue and Compostion at the Conservatorio “G.Verdi” of Milan, after having taught the same subject at the Conservatoire of Bologna between 1982 and 1994; in 1994 he started collaborating with the Contemporary Music department of the International Academy of Music (Fondazione Scuole Civiche di Milano). He held courses at the Centre Acanthes in Avignon (Summer 1996) and in Metz (2005) as well as advanced composition seminars at various High Conservatories, like Paris (1997, 2001 and 2005), Lyon (2003 and 2007), Mexico City (2002), Sydney (1992)…
His works are published by the Edizioni Suvini Zerboni in Milano.