Rossini – Tarantella from La Boutique Fantasque (String Quartet Parts)

Rossini retired from a highly successful and lucrative career as an opera composer before he was 40 years of age, and although he lived almost another 40 years he wrote very little more music except for some short piano pieces of a dance-like nature that he called Sins of Old Age. In 1919 Respighi gathered many of these pieces together and orchestrated them for the ever-popular ballet La Boutique Fantasque. This string quartet is the first of two medleys arranged by Carlo Martelli that includes music from the ballet.

This overture, arranged for string quartet by Carlo Martelli, had previously done service to two other operas by Rossini. However, since those two are virtually forgotten, and The Barber of Seville is one of the most popular operas ever, it is in this titular form that it is remembered.

Rossini retired from a highly successful and lucrative career as an opera composer before he was 40 years of age, and although he lived almost another 40 years he wrote very little more music except for some short piano pieces of a dance-like nature that he called Sins of Old Age. In 1919 Respighi gathered many of these pieces together and orchestrated them for the ever-popular ballet La Boutique Fantasque. This string quartet is the first of two medleys arranged by Carlo Martelli that includes music from the ballet.