Giovanni Giornovichi

Giovanni Mane Giornovichi (Ivan Mane Jarnović) was an Italian violinist and composer of Croatian origin, renowned in late 18th-century Europe for his brilliant virtuosity and expressive violin writing. Probably a pupil of Antonio Lolli, he was reputedly born either in Palermo or at sea en route from Dubrovnik and was baptised in the church of San Antonio Abate. His family is believed to have been of Ragusan origin, and he later appears to have held French citizenship. He built his career as a touring virtuoso, performing his own works and gaining wide recognition in Paris (1770–1779), where his Concert Spirituel debut in 1773 was considered sensational and his playing acclaimed for elegance and expressive refinement.

After a conflict with the Chevalier de Saint-Georges and refusing a duel, he moved to Berlin, where he served the Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm II until 1783, then spent time in Warsaw, where he taught the young Michał Kleofas Ogiński and was also linked to the Polish violinist Felix Janiewicz, described in French sources as his pupil. From 1783–1786 he served as court violinist to Empress Catherine II in Saint Petersburg. Later he lived in Stockholm, Vienna, and from 1791 performed actively in London, also appearing in Bath, Edinburgh and Dublin, where he shared concert programmes with Joseph Haydn. His challenge to Giovanni Battista Viotti to a musical contest ended in defeat, and a further conflict with pianist Johann Cramer again forced his departure.

From 1796 he worked in Hamburg, where contemporary reviews admired the beauty and novelty of his violin concertos, in 1802 in Berlin, and he spent the final years of his life in Saint Petersburg, where he died in 1804. At his funeral Osip Kozlovsky’s Requiem was performed. A bicentennial seminar and concert in his honour was held in Saint Petersburg in 2004. His grandson was the French cellist Yu-Deforges.

Giornovichi composed around 20 violin concertos (17 surviving) and a large quantity of chamber music, including three notable Hamburg quartets and approximately 50 instrumental chamber pieces. He is credited with introducing the romanza as a slow movement in the violin concerto, and the hymn tune ST ASAPH, published in Edinburgh in 1825, is attributed to him. Among his pupils was the young George Bridgetower, later the dedicatee of Beethoven’s Kreutzer Sonata.

Uncertainties remain regarding his early life and identity, compounded by numerous historical variants of his name. His daughters, including Sophia baptised in London in 1795, have been partly traced through later documentation, illuminating previously unknown aspects of his family history.

Birth place / Death place:
Palermo — Saint Petersburg

Years of birth and death:
1747 – 1804

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