Giuseppe Bonno was an Austrian composer

Composer

A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

 of Italian origin. (His name is sometimes given as Josef or Josephus Johannes Baptizta Bon.)

The son of a footman from Brescia who served at the Austrian court, he was born in Vienna

Vienna

Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...

 and studied music with Johann Georg Reinhardt

Johann Georg Reinhardt

Johann Georg Reinhardt was an Austrian composer. Appointed imperial court organist on 1 January 1708, he later became later Kapellmeister of St. Stephen's Cathedral, Vienna. One of his students was Giuseppe Bonno...

, imperial court organist, later Kapellmeister

Kapellmeister

Kapellmeister is a German word designating a person in charge of music-making. The word is a compound, consisting of the roots Kapelle and Meister . The words Kapelle and Meister derive from the Latin: capella and magister...

 of St Stephen's. A gifted pupil, he was then sent to Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

 in 1726 where he studied church music under Francesco Durante

Francesco Durante

Francesco Durante was an Italian composer.He was born at Frattamaggiore, in the Kingdom of Two Sicilies, and at an early age he entered the Conservatorio dei poveri di Gesù Cristo, in Naples, where he received lessons from Gaetano Greco. Later he became a pupil of Alessandro Scarlatti at the...

 and opera under Leonardo Leo

Leonardo Leo

Leonardo Leo , more correctly Lionardo Oronzo Salvatore de Leo, was an Italian Baroque composer.-Biography:...

. He moved back to Vienna in 1736, becoming a court composer there, and working as Kapellmeister to the Prince of Saxe-Hildburghausen

Saxe-Hildburghausen

Saxe-Hildburghausen was an Ernestine duchy in what is now southern Thuringia, Germany. Its territory was similar to that of the modern Hildburghausen district.-History:...

 in the 1750s and 1760s. He died in Vienna.

Bonno's works are rarely heard today, but he was a prominent figure in Viennese musical life in his day and his works were often performed. He worked with two main librettists: Giovanni Claudio Pasquini and Metastasio

Metastasio

Pietro Antonio Domenico Trapassi, better known by his pseudonym of Metastasio, was an Italian poet and librettist, considered the most important writer of opera seria libretti.-Early life:...

. The latter was Bonno's contemporary in Vienna, and the composer wrote the first music for Metastasio's Il natale di Giove (also set by Hasse

Johann Adolph Hasse

Johann Adolph Hasse was an 18th-century German composer, singer and teacher of music. Immensely popular in his time, Hasse was best known for his prolific operatic output, though he also composed a considerable quantity of sacred music...

), Il vero omaggio, Il re pastore (later set by Hasse and Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...

), L'eroe cinese (also set by Hasse), L'isola disabitata (also set by Haydn

Joseph Haydn

Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...

) and L'Atenaide ovvero Gli affetti più generosi.

Most of his output was for vocal forces, including stage works, oratorio

Oratorio

An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...

s, masses

Mass (music)

The Mass, a form of sacred musical composition, is a choral composition that sets the invariable portions of the Eucharistic liturgy to music...

 and other sacred pieces.

Oratorios

• Eleazaro (1739)
• San Paolo in Athene (1740)
• Isacco figura del Redentore (1759)
• Il Giuseppe riconosciuto (1774)

Sources

• Operaglass List of Opera Composers
• Angermüller, Rudolph (1992), 'Bonno, Giuseppe' in The New Grove Dictionary of Opera
  New Grove Dictionary of Opera
  The New Grove Dictionary of Opera is an encyclopedia of opera, considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject. It is the largest work on opera in English, and in its printed form, amounts to 5,448 pages in four volumes....
  
  , ed. Stanley Sadie
  Stanley Sadie
  Stanley Sadie CBE was a leading British musicologist, music critic, and editor. He was editor of the sixth edition of the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians , which was published as the first edition of the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.Sadie was educated at St Paul's School,...
  
  (London) ISBN 0-333-73432-7