The chorusmaster Diego Fasolis studied at the Zurich Conservatory and Musikhochschule with Erich Vollenwyder (organ), Jürg Wintschger (piano), Carol Smith (singing) and Klaus Knall (conducting), obtaining four diplomas with various distinctions. He studied organ and improvisation in Paris with Gaston Litaize and early music performance with Michael Radulescu in Cremona. His international prizes include the Stresa first prize, the first prize and scholarship of the Migros-Göhner Foundation, and the Hegar Prize, and he was a finalist in the Geneva Competition.

As an organist he has performed several times the complete works of Bach, Buxtehude, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Franck and Liszt. He has written music for films and video, with works for organ and for soloists, choir and orchestra. He worked from 1986 as a musician and conductor with RTSI and from 1993 as permanent conductor of the vocal and instrumental groups of Radio Televisione Svizzera, and from 1998 of I Barocchisti, a Baroque orchestra with early instruments. He regularly conducts the Svizzera Italiana Orchestra and the best Swiss orchestras, and has appeared as a guest conductor with leading international ensembles, including the Berlin RIAS Chamber Choir, the Sonatori de la Gioiosa Marca, Concerto Palatino, Orchestra and Chorus of the Verona Arena, the Orchestra and Chorus of La Scala, Milan, and of the Rome and Bologna Operas.

Diego Fasolis enjoys an international reputation. He has recorded over fifty CDs for Arts, Chandos, Claves, BBC, EMI, Amadeus, Divox, and Naxos, and is known as a conductor, teacher and member of international juries.

The Italian composer Cherubini came to occupy a dominant position in French musical life. He was employed at the Conservatoire in Paris on its foundation and from 1822 was director of the institution, retaining this position until the year of his death. His works include compositions for the stage, for the church and for political purposes, a requirement of the turbulent revolutionary years.

Operas

Cherubini wrote some 30 operas and of these Les Deux Journées, now seldom heard, had influence on Beethoven’s only opera, Fidelio. The opera Médée, first staged in Paris in 1797, remains in occasional repertoire, with the aria ‘Ah, nos peines’ providing a popular soprano operatic recital item.

Sacred and Ceremonial Music

Cherubini was able to make full use of his contrapuntal skills, founded in Italian tradition, for his church music, notably in his 1816 Requiem for the anniversary of the death of Louis XVI, a work that later composers took as a model for the genre. He wrote a quantity of music for the celebrations of the new post-Revolutionary regime, and for its successor, once the monarchy was restored.

Instrumental Music

Cherubini’s instrumental music includes a symphony, commissioned in 1815 by the London Philharmonic Society. Many of his other instrumental works are marches, music for various ceremonial occasions.