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The Italian violist and conducor, Giovanni Pasini, grew up in Rome and Sardinia, Italy, surrounded by a family of musicians. He graduated in Viola from the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique (CNSM) in Lyon (1996-2000), where he studied with J.Ph. Vasseur; and subsequently terminated his Post-Graduate studies in Viola at Maastricht University in the class of the celebrated virtuoso Michail Kugel (2003-2004). During his study years he has been a member of both the Italian and the European Union Youth Orchestra, and met with several artists who shaped his musical growth, such as Piero Farulli, Carlo Pozzi, Tabea Zimmermann, Gidon Kremer, Atar Arad, Fabrice Pierre.
Giovanni Pasini has been Principal Viola of the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi (April-October 2000), Orchestra of Teatro Lirico di Cagliari (November 2000-December 2005), Orchestra of Trieste’s Opera House, Malaysian Philharmonic in Kuala Lumpur (January 2006-October 2009), Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo in Brazil (September 2009-June 2010) and West Australian Symphony Orchestra in Perth (July 2010-December 2013). After 15 years as a principal violist in accomplished orchestras around the world, he waas poointed in January 201 as Principal Viola of the Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra (QPO). This is the latest of a series of appointments he won during a twenty-years long successful orchestra career. He was privileged to work with conductors including Lorin Maazel, Riccardo Muti, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Georges Prêtre, Neville Marriner, Colin Davis, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Bernard Haitink and George Pehlivanian, among many others. Observing these gifted conductors inspired him to pursue conducting studies.
Giovanni Pasini is often sought after as guest principal by accomplished orchestras around the world, such as the BBC Philharmonic (Manchester), BBC Wales (Cardiff), Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI, and the Opera de Lyon among others. He also appeared as a soloist in Italy, Brazil, Asia and Middle East, under the baton of, among others, Vittorio Parisi, Matthias Bamert, Paul Daniel, and Yan Pascal Tortelier. Parallel to his career as an instrumentalist, he has been devoting himself since 2010 to the art of orchestra conducting. He was selected for the Australia-based Symphony Services International Conductor Development Program, where he was taught by Christopher Seaman. After attending master-classes across Europe, including with Atso Almila of the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, he obtained his European Master of Music degree in Conducting under the guidance of of renown conductor and pedagogue George Pehlivanian at the Centro Superior de Enseñanza Musical Katarina Gurska in Madrid (2016-2018). During his studies, he built his repertoire conducting various orchestras across the globe, including the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, Auckland Philharmonia, Sydney Sinfonia, Bohuslav Martinu Philharmonic and Cairo Symphony Orchestra.
Giovanni Pasini was a viola professor at the University of Western Australia. He now teaches at the Qatar Music Academy and has given master-classes in the conservatories of Maastricht, Shanghai, Singapore and the ANAM in Melbourne.
In September 2014, with the Qatar Music Academy, Giovanni Pasini co-founded the Qatar Youth Orchestra (QYO), which performs concerts featuring talented young soloists and musicians playing alongside QPO professionals. he has arranged a number of Arabic compositions for western orchestra and Arabic takht for QYO. It was also in September 2014 when he was invited to become conductor of the Qatar Concert Choir, which has fast become the principal choir of its kind, not only in Qatar, but in the Gulf region. The reputation gained by the choir under his direction makes it the obvious choice for the QPO when it comes to choral works to be performed in Doha. In August 2018 the choir travelled outside Qatar for the first time to perform L.v. Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in Malaga, Spain. In December 2018, he made his international debut conducting the QPO during its China tour with Prokofiev’s Peter & the Wolf, and such opportunities continued during the 2019-2020 season, making him the conductor of choice of his own orchestra for local productions. Its solid reputation meant he was called to lead the Qatari team that won the bid to host the 13th World Symposium on Choral Music 2023 (WSCM) - the largest international choral event in the world.
With QPO management’s support and vision, Giovanni Pasini has occasionally conducted his colleagues, notably in the popular Doha Baroque Ensemble and the Cinemoon Ensemble (being both members of QPO), and in some important works for large chamber ensemble, such as Wagner’s Siegfried Idyll and Igor Stravinsky's Dumbarton Oaks. |
