Donizetti, Gaetano

Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti (November 1797 – April 1848) was an Italian opera composer from Bergamo, Lombardy.  Donizetti's most famous work is Lucia di Lammermoor (1835).  Along with Vincenzo Bellini and Gioacchino Rossini, he was a leading composer of bel canto opera.

The youngest of three sons, Donizetti was born in 1797 in Bergamo's Borgo Canale quarter located just outside the city walls. His family was very poor with no tradition of music, his father being the caretaker of the town pawnshop. Nevertheless, Donizetti received some musical instruction from Johann Simon Mayr, a priest at Bergamo's principal church (and also himself a composer of successful operas).