Giovanni Zanotti

Giovanni Calisto Andrea Zanotti (Bologna, 14 October 1738 - Bologna, 1 November 1817) was an Italian composer of the Bolognese school of the late eighteenth century. The nephew of the scholar and scientist Francesco Maria Zanotti, he trained in Bologna with Giovanni Battista Martini in the late 1750s, an association that shaped his entire musical career.

In 1758 he joined the Accademia Filarmonica of Bologna, where he served as prince in 1764 and 1765. From 1761 he was assistant to the maestro di cappella of the basilica of San Petronio and, between 1774 and 1789, he was himself maestro di cappella at that church. His only opera, L'olimpiade, was performed in Bologna during the Carnival, and letters from correspondents in Modena to Martini celebrated its success. In 1774 and 1778 he was in Venice in the service of Count Carlo di Colloredo. When the Liceo Filarmonico was founded in 1804, he was appointed professor of piano, a post he held until 1812.

Almost all of his surviving music is sacred, written for choir, soloists and orchestra. Charles Burney heard his Dixit in 1770 during a concert of the Accademia Filarmonica, which Mozart also attended, and praised it with great enthusiasm. However, an analysis of his output does not entirely support that assessment: Zanotti was a skilful but conservative composer whose work remained within the models inherited from Martini. Most of his scores remain in manuscript, held in the library of the Bologna Conservatory and in the archives of San Petronio.