Michelangelo Rossi

Composer, organist, and violinist Michelangelo Rossi isn’t among the best-known figures of the Baroque era, and some details of his life are lost to time, but he made an undeniable impact, writing operas, madrigals, and, perhaps most importantly, toccatas. Born in Genoa, Italy, c. 1601, Rossi learned the church organ from his uncle. In the second half of the 1620s, he worked in the court of Cardinal Maurizio in Rome and Turin. It was during this time that Rossi composed his madrigals, employing a degree of chromaticism that was unusual for the time. During the 1630s, under the patronage of Taddeo Barberini and then Duke Francesco I d’Este, Rossi wrote a series of operas, including Erminia sul Giordano (1633) and Andromeda (1638). It’s unclear when he wrote his toccatas, but they could have been composed in the 1630s. Containing some of the same chromatic adventurism as his madrigals, they would eventually become his most lasting musical contribution. Rossi died in 1656, by which point he may have retired from composition.