Ruggiero Leoncavallo, a promising representative of the young Italian school, was born in Naples, March 8, 1858. He first studied with Siri, and afterwards learned harmony and the piano from Simonetti. While a student at the Naples Conservatory he was advised by Rossi, one of his teachers, to devote himself to opera. In pursuance of this counsel, he went to Bologna, and there wrote his first opera, "Tommaso Chatterton," which still remains in manuscript and unperformed. Then followed a series of "wander years," during which he visited many European countries, giving lessons in singing and upon the piano, and meeting with varying fortunes. In all these years, however, he cherished the plan of producing a trilogy in the Wagnerian manner with a groundwork from Florentine history. In a letter he says: "I subdivided the historical periods in the following way: first part, 'I Medici,' from the accession of Sextus IV. to the Pazzi conspiracy; second part, 'Savonorola,' from the investiture of Fra Benedetto to the death of Savonorola; third part, 'Cesare Borgia,' from the death of the Duke of Candia to that of Alexander VI." The first part was completed and performed in Milan in November, 1893, and was a failure, notwithstanding its effective instrumentation. It was not so, however, with the little two-act opera "I Pagliacci," which was produced May 21, 1892, at Milan, and met with an instantaneous and enthusiastic success. His next work was a chorus with orchestral accompaniment, the text based upon Balzac's rhapsodical and highly wrought "Seraphita," which was performed at Milan in 1894. It has been recently reported that the Emperor of Germany has given him a commission to produce an opera upon a national subject, "Roland of Berlin." Of his works, "I Pagliacci" is the only one known in the United States. It has met with great favor here, and has become standard in the Italian repertory.
