Giacomo Puccini
Composer

A Small Town and a Big Musical Family

I was born on 22 December 1858 in Lucca, the sixth of nine children, so I learned early how to share the dinner table. My father Michele was a composer and a maestro di cappella, which means music was simply the family trade. I studied in Lucca, with my uncle Fortunato Magi among my teachers, and I took my diploma in 1880. After that I spent about three years at the Milan Conservatory, where Amilcare Ponchielli and Antonio Bazzini taught me how to turn a good idea into a finished piece.

The Night Milan Noticed Me

My first opera, Le Villi, was premiered at the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan on 31 May 1884. For a young man fresh from his studies, it was a very good way to introduce myself. Then came Manon Lescaut, premiered at the Teatro Regio in Turin on 2 February 1893. By then I had worked out what I wanted from an opera: people on stage who feel things so strongly that the audience can't help feeling them too.

A Quiet Corner Away From the Noise

From 1891 I spent most of my time at Torre del Lago, near Lucca and Viareggio. It was a peaceful place, and peace is very useful when you are trying to hear a melody in your head. Around 1900 I built Villa Puccini there, and I lived in it until 1921. Opera houses in Milan, Turin and Rome kept calling me away, but this was the place I always came home to.

The Greatest Hits, Tears Included

La bohème was premiered in Turin on 1 February 1896, with Arturo Toscanini conducting, and it is a story of young friends, love and bad luck. Tosca followed in Rome at the Teatro Costanzi on 14 January 1900, and it is a thriller with music, so it keeps you on the edge of your seat. Madama Butterfly is the one that most often leaves a theatre full of people searching their pockets for a handkerchief. Then there is Nessun dorma, which belongs to Turandot: a tenor sings alone, the melody climbs higher and higher, and the final note arrives like a great wave breaking over the whole orchestra.

When the Audience and My Own House Turned on Me

Madama Butterfly was premiered at La Scala in Milan on 17 February 1904, and its first version was poorly received. That was a hard evening, but I kept the opera, and today it is among the most performed in the world. A far heavier trouble came in 1909, when my wife Elvira, whom I had married in 1904, publicly accused our maid Doria Manfredi of an affair with me. That accusation was false: Doria died by suicide, an autopsy showed the rumour was untrue, Elvira was convicted of slander, and a payment from me to Doria's family spared her the sentence.

Travelling Far, Then Running Out of Time

In my later years my operas crossed the ocean, and La fanciulla del West was premiered at the Metropolitan Opera in New York on 10 December 1910. Il trittico, three short operas in one evening, followed at the same theatre on 14 December 1918. Late in 1923 a sore throat began that would not go away, and it turned out to be throat cancer. I went to Brussels for an experimental radiation treatment, and I died there on 29 November 1924, aged 65, just a few months after being named a senator for life.

The Unfinished Princess and What Came After

Turandot was left unfinished when I died, and I want to be clear that I did not write its ending. Franco Alfano completed the last two scenes, and the opera was premiered at La Scala on 25 April 1926. I was first buried in the Toscanini family tomb in Milan, and later in 1926 my son moved my remains to a chapel in the villa at Torre del Lago, so I did get back home. These days I'm told that, for performances between 2004 and 2018, only Verdi and Mozart were staged more often than I was.

What I Would Like to Hand You

I would like to give you a feeling, and you don't need to know anything about music to receive it. When a character in one of my operas is in love, afraid or heartbroken, I want you to feel it in your chest before you have time to think about it. So if you only know Nessun dorma, listen to it once with your eyes closed and let the voice carry you. If it moves you, then I have done my job, and you can come and find the rest of my operas whenever you like.