Roman Vlad (29 December 1919 – 21 September 2013) was a

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, a ...

n-born

Italia Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

n composer,

pianist A pianist ( , ) is an individual musician who plays the piano. Since most forms of Western music can make use of the piano, pianists have a wide repertoire and a wide variety of styles to choose from, among them traditional classical music, j ...

, and

musicologist Musicology (from Greek μουσική ''mousikē'' 'music' and -λογια ''-logia'', 'domain of study') is the scholarly analysis and research-based study of music. Musicology departments traditionally belong to the humanities, although some m ...

Biography

Born in Cernăuți,

Bukovina Bukovinagerman: Bukowina or ; hu, Bukovina; pl, Bukowina; ro, Bucovina; uk, Буковина, ; see also other languages. is a historical region, variously described as part of either Central or Eastern Europe (or both).Klaus Peter Berge ...

(now

Chernivtsi Chernivtsi ( uk, Чернівці́}, ; ro, Cernăuți, ; see also #Names, other names) is a city in the historical region of Bukovina, which is now divided along the Romania–Ukraine border, borders of Romania and Ukraine, including this ...

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian invas ...

), he studied with Titus Tarnawski and Liviu Russu in Romania earning a piano diploma. He moved to

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus ( legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

in 1938 to study at the University of Rome and later the

Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia The Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia ( en, National Academy of St Cecilia) is one of the oldest musical institutions in the world, founded by the papal bull ''Ratione congruit'', issued by Sixtus V in 1585, which invoked two saints promi ...

. He eventually became an Italian citizen in 1951. Vlad's early career was as a performer and composer; he won the

Enescu Prize The Enescu Prize is a prize in music composition founded by Romanian composer George Enescu, awarded from 1913 to 1946, and afterwards by the National University of Music Bucharest. Enescu is regarded by many as Romania's most important musician. ...

in 1942 for his Sinfonietta, and the

Silver Ribbon The Nastro d'Argento, also known by its translated name Silver Ribbon, is an Italian film award awarded each year since 1946 by the Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists (Italian: ''Sindacato Nazionale Giornalisti Cinematografici Italian ...

Award for his film music. He was the artistic director of '' Accademia Filarmonica Romana'' from 1955 to 1958 and again from 1966 to 1969. As well, he was the president of the Italian Society for Contemporary Music in 1960 and musical consultant for the third RAI national radio and television network. He was later a member of the Directory Council of the National Academy of Santa Cecilia and artistic consultant for the Ravenna Festival and the

Spoleto Festival The ''Festival dei Due Mondi'' (Festival of the Two Worlds) is an annual summer music and opera festival held each June to early July in Spoleto, Italy, since its founding by composer Gian Carlo Menotti in 1958. It features a vast array of conce ...

. Vlad was an eclectic composer whose works range from

symphonies A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, most often for orchestra. Although the term has had many meanings from its origins in the ancient Greek era, by the late 18th century the word had taken on the meaning c ...

operas Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libre ...

chamber music Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small num ...

to "The Japanese Seasons, 24 Haiku." He was a noted composer of

film music A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film. The score comprises a number of orchestral, instrumental, or choral pieces called cues, which are timed to begin and end at specific points during the film in order to ...

, including the scores to

René Clair René Clair (11 November 1898 – 15 March 1981), born René-Lucien Chomette, was a French filmmaker and writer. He first established his reputation in the 1920s as a director of silent films in which comedy was often mingled with fantasy. He wen ...

's ''

La Beauté du diable ''La Beauté du diable'' (literally "the beauty of the devil"; originally released in the UK and USA as ''Beauty and the Devil'') is a 1950 Franco-Italian fantasy film drama directed by René Clair. A tragicomedy set in the early 19th century, it ...

'' (1950), '' Pictura: An Adventure in Art'' (1951), ''

Romeo and Juliet ''Romeo and Juliet'' is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetime and, along with ''Ham ...

'' (1954), '' I Vampiri'' (1957), '' Son of the Red Corsair'' (1959), '' Ursus'' (1961) and '' The Horrible Dr. Hichcock'' (1962). Vlad wrote significant books about music, including ''The History of Twelve-Tone Music'' (1958) and biographies of

Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor, later of French (from 1934) and American (from 1945) citizenship. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential composers of the ...

and Dallapiccola. Works for the general public include ''Understanding Music'' and ''Introduction to Musical Civilization''. Vlad died, aged 93, in Rome on 21 September 2013.Addio Roman Vlad, grande musicologo

Selected filmography

* ''

Tragic Spell ''Tragic Spell'' (Italian: ''Incantesimo tragico (Oliva)'') is a 1951 Italian historical melodrama film directed by Mario Sequi and starring María Félix, Rossano Brazzi and Massimo Serato.Darby p.449 It was shot at Cinecittà Studios in Rome. Th ...

'' (1951) * '' I Chose Love'' (1953) * '' The Three Thieves'' (1954) * '' I Vampiri'' (1957) * '' The Son of the Red Corsair'' (1959) * '' The Crossroads'' (1960)

References

*Roberta Costa. The ''

New Grove Dictionary of Opera ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'' is an encyclopedia of opera, considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject. It is the largest work on opera in English, and in its printed form, amounts to 5,448 pages in four volu ...

'', edited by Stanley Sadie (1992). and

Relevant literature

* Pasticci, Susanna. "Hermeneutics and Creative Process: Roman Vlad’s Reception of Stravinsky." ''Archival Notes: Sources and Research from the Institute of Music'' 2 (2017): 41–63.

External links

* 1919 births 2013 deaths Romanian classical composers Italian classical composers Italian male classical composers Italian opera composers Male opera composers Sapienza University of Rome alumni Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia alumni Romanian emigrants to Italy Italian classical pianists Male classical pianists Italian male pianists Italian musicologists Musicians from Chernivtsi Nastro d'Argento winners Italian film score composers Italian male film score composers 20th-century classical pianists 20th-century Italian musicians Enescu Prize winners Commandeurs of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres 20th-century Italian male musicians Stravinsky scholars {{italy-composer-stub