Gaetano Pugnani
Gaetano Pugnani (27 November 1731 – 15 July 1798, full name: Giulio Gaetano Gerolamo Pugnani) was an Italian composer and violinist.
Also recorded as Giulio Gaetano Pugnani · Pugnani
Gaetano Pugnani

Unidentified painter · Public domain
- Full name
- Giulio Gaetano Gerolamo Pugnani.
- Born
- 1731. · Turin.
- Died
- 1798. · Turin.
- Occupation
- composer, concertmaster, violinist and conductor.
- Fields
- opera and symphony.
- Teachers
- Giovanni Battista Somis and Pasquale Bini.
VALÉORINE Encyclopedia
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Documentary summary
Gaetano Pugnani (27 November 1731 – 15 July 1798, full name: Giulio Gaetano Gerolamo Pugnani) was an Italian composer and violinist.
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Note VALÉORINE
Gaetano Pugnani (1731–1798) was a composer, concertmaster and conductor, among other activities. Born Giulio Gaetano Gerolamo Pugnani in Turin, the composer died in Turin. Genres include opera and symphony.
Composed from admitted, traceable facts · 27 September 2026
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museum · 6394bece-8397-4d66-8610-7feb6b0e23de · wikidata · Q560926 · wikipedia · Gaetano Pugnani
In this article
Biography
Biography
Gaetano Pugnani was born in 1731 in Turin, the city where he spent most of his life, son of Giovanni Battista Pugnani, secretary in the office of the Director of the Settlement of Turin. The Pugnani originate from the comune of Cumiana, where they held a common farm and where the musician returned often. He trained on the violin under Giovanni Battista Somis, founder of the Piedmontese school of violin playing. In 1752, Pugnani became the first violinist of the Royal Chapel of Turin, and then went on a large tour that granted him great fame for his extraordinary skill on the violin. In 1754, he was very well received at the Concert Spirituel in Paris, but in 1768 he had an even more successful musical encounter in London, directing the King's Theatre from 1767 to 1769. During these years Pugnani worked closely with Johann Christian Bach and Carl Friedrich Abel. In 1770, Pugnani returned home to Turin and became the director of the Royal Chapel. Mozart and his father Leopold met Pugnani a year later when they visited Turin. His fame as a composer began to grow, but it would never equal his fame as a violinist. During this time, he also taught the violin. His most famous pupil was Giovanni Battista Viotti; in 1766 Viotti was placed at the cost of the Prince de la Cisterne under Pugnani. From 1780 to 1782 they performed in Switzerland, Dresden, Warsaw and St. Petersburg. Pugnani died in Turin in 1798. His funeral was modest as was his will and he was buried in the cemetery of St. Peter in Vincoli. Fritz Kreisler borrowed Pugnani's name in order to publish some of his pieces (such as Praeludium and Allegro and Tempo di Minuetto), but in 1935 Kreisler revealed that these works were actually his own.
Operas
Operas
Operas with music by Gaetano Pugnani: Nanetta e Lubino. Opera buffa, libretto by Carlo Francesco Badini, 1769. The first performance took place on 8 April 1769 at the King's Theatre, London Issea. Libretto by Vittorio Amadeo Cigna-Santi, 1771 Tamas Kouli-Kan nell'Indie. Libretto by Vittorio Amadeo Cigna-Santi, 1772 Aurora. Libretto by Giandomenico Boggio, 1775 Achille in Sciro. Libretto by Pietro Metastasio, revised by Vittorio Amedeo Cigna-Santi, 1785. This opera, divided into 3 acts, was premiered at the Teatro Regio in Turin on 15 January. Demofoonte. Libretto by Pietro Metastasio, 1787. Opera in three acts premiered at the Teatro Regio in Turin on 26 December. Demetrio a Rodi. Libretto by Giandomenico Boggio and Giuseppe Banti, 1789 La Betulia Liberata. Oratoria sacra, libretto by Pietro Metastasio. Dedicated to the Queen of Portugal. This opera was performed in 2012 by the Portuguese Symphonic Orquestra directed by Donato Renzetti, in collaboration with the musicologist Pietro Dossena.
Chamber music
Chamber music
6 quartets for strings 18 sonatas for violin and continuo 6 quintets for 2 flutes (oboes), 2 corni ad lib, 2 violins, basso continuo 6 trios for harpsichord, violin and cello 6 sonatas for 2 violins
Life and career
Dated record
Life and career
The full dated record · 2 entries
1769
Nanetta e Lubino, a new comic opera; imitated from the French, by Carlo Francesco Badini. As perform'd at the King's-Theatre in the Hay-Market. The music entirely new by Signor Gaetano Pugnani, dated 1769, held by Wellcome Collection.
1798
Gaetano Pugnani died in 1798 at Turin.
Primary material
Documents and archives
scholarly publication
- Brief von Gaetano Pugnani an Viotti, Giovanni Battista Viotti (1755 - 1824), 2018
Scholarly · Crossref registry · 2018
- Pugnani, Gaetano (opera), Oxford Music Online, 2002
Scholarly · Crossref registry · 2002
reference work
- Wikidata, structured authority record Q560926: Gaetano Pugnani
Reputable secondary · Wikimedia Foundation
- “Gaetano Pugnani”, English Wikipedia, consulted as further reading
Reputable secondary · Wikipedia
Institutional database
- MusicBrainz artist record for Gaetano Pugnani
Scholarly · MetaBrainz Foundation
Notes from the source article
Cited by Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
These works are cited by the source article, in its own numbering. They are recorded as its citations, not as sources VALÉORINE has verified.
- 1.Giorgio Enrico Cavallo. Gaetano Pugnani e i musicisti della corte sabauda nel XVIII Secolo. Roberto Chiaramonte Editore. 9. 2015.
- 2.Giorgio Enrico Cavallo. Gaetano Pugnani e i musicisti della corte sabauda nel XVIII Secolo. Roberto Chiaramonte Editore. 7–9. 2015.
- 3.Warwick Lister, Amico: The Life of Giovanni Battista Viotti (Oxford University Press, 2009).
- 4.Cf. Simon McVeigh, The Violinists in London Concert Life 1750–1784 (New York and London: Garland, 1989), 70.
- 5.In the libretto of his opera Demetrio a Rodi (1789) he is mentioned as Maestro Gaetano Pugnani, primo Violino, e primo Virtuoso di Camera di S.M., Direttore generale della Musica instrumentale della Regia Cappella, e Camera, e della Musica militare.
- 6.28. 108.
- 7.Giorgio Enrico Cavallo. Gaetano Pugnani e i musicisti della corte sabauda nel XVIII Secolo. Roberto Chiaramonte Editore. 41. 2015.
- 8.Fritz Kreisler. hoaxes.org.
- 9.Source: http://operadata.stanford.edu
- 10.The parts of the overture are available from .
- 11.An adaptation of Annette et Lubin by Marie J.B. Fauart and J.B. Lourdet de Santerre, cf. Stanford Univ. Libraries: http://searchworks.stanford.edu/view/8072121.
- 12.Manuscript copy of the full score archived in Biblioteca da Ajuda , Lisbon. Cf. page 241 of Claudio Re, Gaetano Pugnani and the eighteenth-century Italian symphony: a study and edition of the Overture in E-flat (ZT 23). PhD thesis, U. Florida, 2011.
- 13.L'Aurora: festa per musica, da rappresentarsi nel Regio Teatro di Torino per le nozze delle AA.RR. di Carlo Emanuele, principe di Piemonte e di Adelaide Clotilde di Francia, l'anno MDCCLXXV. Available from archive.org.
- 14.:es:Aquiles en Esciro (Pugnani)
- 15.Cf. Demofonte (Pugnani). The libretto is available from the Bayerischen Staatsbibliothek
- 16.Modern edition (ed: Pietro Dossena) of the score available from .
- 17.The dedication reads: Oratorio Sacro del Abate Metastasio messo in Musica da Gaetano Pugnani, e dal medesimo umilmente dedicato A Sua Maesta Fedelissima La Regina di Portogallo.
- 18.Cf. Publico newspaper, 23/06/2012.
- 19.Scintilla – Early Italian String Quartets, Butter Quartet, Brilliant Classics 97407 (2025)
Bibliography printed in the source article · 2
- cite book
- cite book
References
Citations
References
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scholarly publication
VerifiedInstitutional database
MusicBrainz artist record for Gaetano PugnaniMetaBrainz Foundation
Verifiedscholarly publication
Pugnani, Gaetano (opera), Oxford Music Online, 2002Crossref registry
Verifiedreference work
Wikidata, structured authority record Q560926: Gaetano PugnaniWikimedia Foundation
Partially resolvedreference work
Partially resolved
The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 14 August 2026.
Elsewhere in Music memorabilia
42,307 published records in this field, each with its sources named.
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