Born Mestrino, Padua, 5 December 1934.
Died Vicenza, 22 September 1999.
Italian tenor.
Pietro Bottazzo had a notable international career, specializing in the extremely florid and high-lying tenor roles composed by Rossini in Naples. He therefore took part in many revivals of unknown operas which had been unperformable during the many decades when such voices had simply not existed.
He studied at the Milan Conservatorio under Maria Carbone, making his debut in 1960 at the Teatro Nuovo, as Wilhelm Meister in a revival of Mignon.
His repertoire included Mozart (Belmonte, Tamino, Tito) and Donizetti (Riccardo Percy, Nemorino, Ernesto) as well as Verdi (Fenton). He worked in most of the major Italian houses, including La Scala.
He did sing popular Rossini operas such as Il barbiere di Siviglia and Le comte Ory, but his more important appearances probably came in little-known serious Rossini works - in Rome (Otello 1964), Venice (Armida 1970) and Palermo (Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra 1971). Appearances outside Italy included Vienna, Barcelona, Chicago and the Met. He sang at the Salzburg Festival in 1971 and '72 as Ernesto Don Pasquale - just before his Edinburgh appearance.
His British debut was at the 1965 Glyndebourne Festival, when he sang Paolino in Cimarosa's Il matrimonio segreto. His later appearances in the British Isles were all in Rossini rarities, firstly at the 1967 Wexford Festival, as Rodrigo in Otello, returning the following year for Ermanno in L'equivoco stravagante. His one appearance in Scotland was as Norfolk in Elisabetta, regina d'Inghilterra on the Palermo company's visit to the 1972 Edinburgh Festival.
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