December 19, 2004

BY ART GOLAB Staff Reporter

University of Chicago musicologist Philip Gossett had come in to the office early Thursday to do some photocopying for his class when he spotted a letter in his mailbox. It informed him he had won the $1.5 million Mellon Distinguished Achievement Award, an honor for which he never even knew he was being considered.

"I opened it up and said, 'Oh my God,' " said Gossett. "And then I went and taught my classes. What else do you do? This is the University of Chicago, right?"

Gossett, 63, has been described by Opera News as "the top expert in the world" on Italian opera composers Rossini, Donizetti and Verdi. In fact, he made his reputation by being among the first academics to focus on those composers, at a time when they were considered too "popular" to deserve the attention of serious scholars.

Works performed worldwide

"If you were going to be a serious musicologist, you had to study Beethoven or Bach or Gregorian chants, but Rossini -- that was a pretty funny idea," he said.

The award, which supports research within the winner's university, will help Gossett advance his 20-year old project of creating new definitive critical editions of both Rossini's and Verdi's works.

Much of what they wrote was never published until the turn of the last century or later -- many years after it was written, and then in editions heavily edited to reflect then-current musical tastes.

Gossett and his colleagues scour the world seeking original manuscripts, then labor to reconcile various versions to come up with critical definitive editions as close to what the composer intended as possible. Many of the works Gossett edited have been used in performances around the world.

"The Voyage to Rheims," a formerly lost Rossini opera discovered by Gossett, received its first Chicago performance last year.

Advises opera companies

A new version of Verdi's "The Force of Destiny," edited by Gossett, will be performed next November at the San Francisco Opera.

Gossett fell in love with opera as a young boy while listening to New York Metropolitan Opera broadcasts with his father. Much later, he would appear many times on those broadcasts explaining the histories of the operas and their composers, a task he also performed frequently for the Lyric Opera of Chicago when its performances were broadcast on WFMT's classical network.

He also advises opera companies on their productions, and he has coached singers such as Renee Fleming, Marilyn Horne and Sam Ramey on how to sing the Italian repertory.

Gossett is also working on a book, Divas and Scholars: Performing Italian Opera, which will be published early next year.

Though Gossett started taking piano lessons at the age of 5 and kept at it through college, he originally trained to be a physicist. A wise professor noticed his lack of enthusiasm and recommended he try musicology.

The new subject clicked with him, but Gossett said his physics background is one of the foundations of his success. "The logic, the clarity of thought necessary to do that work, is very much a part of who I am and the way I work and the way I teach," he said.

Gossett's team has completed 12 of 33 projected volumes of Verdi's work and more than 30 volumes of an expected 70 for Rossini. "I'll never get through the Rossini," Gossett said. "But the Verdi -- I'm hoping. Particularly with this grant."