Nino Rota

Giovanni Rota was born in Milan in December 1911 and proved prolific early, writing more than 150 film scores between the 1930s and his death in 1979. He became Federico Fellini's regular composer and also scored films for Luchino Visconti, then crossed into Hollywood with Franco Zeffirelli's Shakespeare adaptations and Francis Ford Coppola's first two Godfather films, winning the Oscar for Part II in 1974. In 1954 alone he completed thirteen film scores. Alongside the cinema work he composed ten operas, five ballets, a string concerto, and theatre music for Visconti, Zeffirelli, and Eduardo De Filippo, all while directing the Liceo Musicale in Bari for nearly thirty years. He died in April 1979.