Talk:Giovanni Bottesini

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WikiProject Echo has identified Giovanni Bottesini as a foreign language featured article. You may be able to improve this article with information from the German language Wikipedia.

where was Giovanni Bottesini born

According to my understanding, Bottesini was born on Dec 22, 1821 in Crema, Italy. Crema is located in the Lombardy region of Italy. --Bottesini 15:37, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that he switched not because only the bassoon and double bass slots were available, but because scholarships were available for those instruments. Bottesini 20:59, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Someone is suggesting we merge Juan Bottesini into this article? Why would we do that if it isn't the same person? Bsbaixo 12:26, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

"Juan Bottesini" is simply a spanish version of the italian name Giovanni Bottesini. According to Paul Brun's "A new history of the double bass" (ISBN 2-9514461-0-1) the great double bass virtuoso and maestro worked as music director for the Teatro Santa Ana in Mexico in 1853-1854. Also, in Jorge Velasco's book "La música por dentro" (Mexico, UNAM) is mentioned that not only he premiered the work but also that he took the freedom to "retouch" some details. If you are familiar with Giovanni (or Juan or whatsoever) Bottesini's music, it might be of interest to you to have a second listen to Mexico's national anthem. Perhaps you will find something of interest in the orchestration. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.60.169.19 (talk) 23:01, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

About the confusion with "Juan" Bottesini, see my post on that article's talk page. As I did in my German version of the article (de:Giovanni Bottesini), I'd like to put up a big caveat lector sign when it comes to all the info given on bottesini.com. The guy is obviously an expert on all things Bottesini, but also a first-class prankster with a rather outlandish sense of humor. Meaning that the site offers a lot of great resources and a heap of rubbish, too (albeit top-level nonsense). It's a lot of fun for bass players, but I strongly recommend to back up any piece of information taken from there with a second, independent source. --Rainer Lewalter 08:54, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

As far as I know everything at gbottesini.com is correct. I still need to do a lot of bibliographical work. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bsbaixo (talk • contribs) 13:31, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

You're right, most of the stuff on gbottesini.com is quite okay. I already did a lot of biographical research, and I have no problem with the fact that certain incongruities remain, simply because of imprecisions in the sources. Notice, however, that that is not the site I was talking about. bottesini.com (without the initial "g") is the place with all the weird conspiracy theories, the deliberate disinformation and the fake legends. Like I said, it's very funny nevertheless. --Rainer Lewalter 13:57, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

8o) Did you find everything you need? I am the gbottesini.com caretaker. If you need anything else let me know! Bsbaixo 13:11, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, like it says in various places on gbottesini.com, there's a lot of speculation and insecurities surrounding the man and his life. I didn't want to go too deep into minute and maybe inconsequential details, but outline Bottesini's life, put his career into the overall context of his times, provide a general idea of his musical achievements and also, to a certain extent, give the reader an idea of the legendary aspects. My main references were the books by Planyavsky and Warnecke, which you also used, plus one book by the Milanese musicologist, Inzaghi. Some details were taken from more general musical reference books; as to the Arditi bio, I'm not at all sure about its value. About the Testore bass, I consulted a luthier residing here in Berlin who was lucky enough to have been given the opportunity to analyze and scrutinize the instrument as such under every relevant aspect. There's a link to his publication in the German article. If you happen to read German, maybe you can look through the article and comment on that version? Thx, --Rainer Lewalter 16:58, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Hi, I whacked the notes section because it referenced a web page with dubious information. At the end of that page it refers to the current owner of the testore instrument as Gary Automoblie which I can't find on the internet or anywhere else, comments? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bsbaixo (talk • contribs) 23:11, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, that bit is most certainly one of those bassists' inside jokes I was referring to. My conjecture is that the guy who put together that page assumes everybody, or at least every bass player, is in the know about Gary Karr and his famous instrument, now known as the Karr-Koussevitzky bass. --Rainer Lewalter 23:31, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree. It is actually funny, but I felt that this site serves different purposes. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bsbaixo (talk • contribs) 13:40, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

As a matter of fact, I can't escape the impression that the site serves many different purposes ;-) Although (fortunately, I'm inclined to think) it's quite an "old" place by internet criteria and many subpages are not very accessible unless you really want to find the spoof biography, a lot of fake information has found its way out into the world. Small wonder, musicians and listeners alike do love the legend business... For example, it seems to become accepted wisdom that Karr actually owned the Testore at some point in his career. But I haven't found any source that really would confirm that claim. --Rainer Lewalter 10:41, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Rainer (and anyone else reading this article), hi, sorry for writing you here but I didn't have any other way to contact you. I have added discussion forums to my site. You are invited to participate. http://gbottesini.com/forum —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.80.80.50 (talk) 12:36, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

About Juan Bottesini, I agree we should merge the articles. According to this site http://www.grito-independencia-mexico.com/historia-himno-nacional-mexicano.php (in Spanish) Santa Anna, made a contest to choose the Mexican national anthem, the contest was won by Bottesini on the music, but it was not well received by the people, so they chose the music of the actual national anthem, Bottesini conducted the premiere of the national anthem, and I read he made some arrangements, the original key signature of the anthem is F major, Bottesini changed it to C major so it could be sung. Gabrielsz87 08:24, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how the quintettobottesini link is relevant to this article. Can anyone give me a reason not to delete it? It is about the group not the composer. I suggest they make a quintettobottesini page for themselves.Bsbaixo (talk) 12:50, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

As a matter of fact, the same IP did the same edit in the German article, which I deleted immediately. A little later, the same IP (a member, agent or ardent fan, one is inclined to suspect, since the person seems to know that site pretty well) came up with a more valuable link to an audio sample from a performance of the Elegia, which I thought was okay. That link is still in the German article, if you feel like using it here as well. --Rainer Lewalter (talk) 16:32, 20 May 2008 (UTC)