Guido Cantelli

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Guido Cantelli (April 27, 1920 – November 24, 1956) was an Italian orchestral conductor.

[edit] Biography

Born in Novara, Italy, Cantelli was named Musical Director of La Scala, Milan on November 16, 1956, but his promising career was tragically cut short by his death at the age of 36 in an airplane crash in Paris, France only one week later.

In the course of his brief career, he had conducted not only in many of the most famous concert halls of Europe but also in the United States and South Africa. The famous conductor Arturo Toscanini was particularly impressed by him, and, in a note written to Cantelli's wife Iris in 1950 after four concerts where Cantelli had been a guest conductor with the NBC Symphony Orchestra, said:

I am happy and moved to inform you of Guido's great success and that I introduced him to my orchestra, which loves him as I do. This is the first time in my long career that I have met a young man so gifted. He will go far, very far. ^[1]

Toscanini, who died less than two months after Cantelli's plane crash, was never told of Cantelli's death.

Cantelli left a small but valuable legacy of recordings. Among them are recordings of Beethoven's 7th symphony, Brahms' 1st and 3rd symphonies, Franck's D minor symphony (with the NBC Symphony), Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, Liszt's 2nd piano concerto with Claudio Arrau, and shorter pieces by Ravel, Rossini, and others. His one surviving opera performance is of Così fan tutte, from La Scala in 1956. There is also a live CD recording of him conducting the Verdi Requiem (with Herva Nelli). The Franck, Brahms 3rd, and Beethoven 7th are among his few stereo recordings. Just before he died, he recorded the final three movements of Beethoven's Symphony No. 5 for EMI, but did not record the first movement. In recent years, many performances from broadcasts with the NBC Symphony have been made available.