- gressed rapidly in lighter work. He became absorbed in studies of Haydn's
and Mozart's works (being called 'the little German') and acquired facility in orchestration. He was then and always popular for his gay spirits and his ready versatility.
At 18 (1810) he wrote his first stage-work, the farce La cambiale di matrimonio, for a Venice theatre, followed in 1811 by an opera buffa (Bologna) and in 1812 by an opera seria (Rome). These were so successful that in the next ten years he was incessantly busy, hurrying from city to city and bringing out no less than 30 stage-works of various kinds, mostly comic—9 at Venice, 10 at Naples, 5 each at Milan and Rome and 1 at Lisbon. His initial success at Milan was with La pietra del paragone (1812), in which he used his afterwards overworked crescendo. The first significant effort was Tancredi (1813, Venice), which, though not free from plagiarisms, revealed his extraordinary verve and ingenuity. Il turco in Italia (1814, Milan) later came into much favor. In 1815, cast down by a transient set-back, he was about to drop composing when Barbaja, the Naples manager, engaged him to prepare two operas a year on a good salary (partly derived from the public gambling-houses, of which Barbaja was also proprietor). Though opposed by the Neapolitan circle, he made a hit with Elisabetta (1815—plot curiously like that of Scott's 'Kenilworth'), in which he began to discard the recitativo secco. In the same year at Rome he produced Il barbiere di Siviglia (first called Almaviva), which at the outset was resented because on a libretto already famous with Paisiello's music, but which soon captivated the world as the brightest and wittiest of comic operas. In 1816 appeared Otello, in which the transition from pure recitative was carried to completion. 1817 was marked by the comic opera Cenerentola (Rome), which is counted as the second-best in its class, and by the romantic Armida (Naples), which is full of imaginative splendor. In 1818 came the partly noble Mosè in Egitto (completed 1827), which later figured as an oratorio, and the florid Ricciardo e Zoraide (both at Naples). The violent revolution of 1820 at Naples drove out the king, ruined Barbaja and set Rossini planning a visit to Vienna. On the way, at Bologna, he married Isabella Colbran, a wealthy singer, seven years his senior.
At Vienna he was well received, made friends by his humor and affability, and secured applause for his carefully drafted Zelmira (1822). Soon after, Prince Metternich asked him to provide amusement for the royalties gathered at the Congress of Verona, for which he wrote and conducted a series of clever cantatas. In 1823 was produced one of his most ambitious and thoughtful works, Semiramide (Venice), which, however, was not at first liked. Late in the year he set out, by way of Paris, for London, where he was lionized by high society, including special favor from George IV.
During 1824-6 he was director of the Théâtre Italien at Paris, where he decidedly improved the technical standard of performance, revised and reproduced some of his earlier works, and brought out Il viaggio a Reims (1825), as well as Meyerbeer's Il crociato, the first of the latter's works to be heard in Paris. From 1826 he was named Royal Composer and Inspector, with a salary, but no stated duties. He continued to revive and improve old works (notably his Mosè in 1827), and began seriously to study Beethoven. In 1829 he reached his highest artistic point in Guillaume Tell, in which he
