Composer
Conductor
Choir director
Bandoneonist
Clarinettist
Daniel René Pacitti Fontanini
Born in Argentina, Daniel Pacitti attends the music school in Santa Fé and studies piano and clarinet at the National Conservatory in Buenos Aires. At the age of 17, he wins the 1st prize in the Jovenes Concertitas Argentinos and the 1st prize in the Solistas del Mozarteum competition and is subsequently appointed first clarinet in the Santa Fé Chamber Orchestra.
He continues his studies at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena, where he takes part in the clarinet courses of Giuseppe Garvarino. At the same time he studies at the International Academy of Music in Biella with Antony Pay (London Symphony Orchestra - BBC Symphony Orchestra) and in Riva del Garda with Karl Leister (Berlin Philharmonic).
Pacitti enters the Conservatoire Maurice Ravel in Paris and studies clarinet with Jean-Marc Volta, harmony and counterpoint with Pierre Durant, orchestration with Patrice Sciortino and musical analysis with Alain Margoni. At the same time, he attends courses in advanced choral and orchestral conducting with Jean-Jacques Werner and Pierre Cao at the Centre d'Art Polyphonique de Paris.
He already plays first clarinet in the Ensemble International de Paris when, by unanimous decision of the musicians, he is appointed conductor of the orchestra in 1989 and performs in major Parisian concert halls. The following year he attends a master class in orchestral conducting with Bruno Weil in Vienna and meets Carlo Maria Giulini and Bruno Bettinelli in Milan.
Pacitti was artistic and musical director of the State Philharmonic Orchestra of Moldova. He was also artistic and musical director of the Orchestra da Camera della Lombardia, which also performed with him at the European Parliament, and artistic and musical director of the Orchestra Sinfonica Guido Cantelli in Milan. In Trieste, he was artistic director of the Teatro Lirico Giuseppe Verdi.
He also cooperated as a conductor with numerous orchestras, among them the National Orchestra of Santiago de Chile, Radio 1 Orchestra of Moscow, National Orchestra of Sao Paolo, Symphonic Orchestra of Santa Fe, St. Petersburg Capella Orchestra, Radio Orchestra of Tirana, Radio Orchestra of Bucarest, National Opera of Bucarest, Opera Theater of Lima, Symphonic Orchestra of Udine, Sinfonietta Paris, Kibbutz Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra Sinfonica di San Remo, Philharmonic Orchestra of Regensburg, Archi della Scala, Orchestra da Camera della Lombardia, Camerata Strumentale Italiana of Trieste, Orquesta Sinfônica de Santo André (Brasil), Symphonic Orchestra of Tokyo, Philharmonic Orchestra of Greensboro (USA), Orchestra Sinfonica Guido Cantelli of Milan, Orchestra del Festival d'Avenches (Switzerland), Orchestra I Pomeriggi Musicali of Milan, Orchestra of the Croatian National Opera in Zagreb, Zugló Philharmonia Szent István Király Symphony Orchestra Budapest, Brandenburgisches Staatsorchester Frankfurt.
Pacitti was orchestra conductor in two editions of the International Violin Competition "Rodolfo Lipizer Award". He conducted a concert with Giovanni Angeleri (Primo Premio Paganini 1997) in South America, performing Paganini's five violin concertos. In Chișinău (Republic of Moldova), he worked with Casa Ricordi as artistic and musical director of the festival Il 900 Italiano.
Pacitti conducted the Choir Musici Europae in Paris, the Coro Nacional de Chile, the Coro Nacional de Peru, the Choir of the Festival de Avenches, the Choir of the Bucharest Opera, the Choir of the Zagreb Opera, the Polyphonic Choir of Santa Fé, the Choir of the Opera and the Choir Capella of the Philharmonic in Moldova.
For ANTES CONCERTO Pacitti has recorded Strutture and Sinfonia No. 7 by Bruno Bettinelli, as well as Tentazioni e Montmartre by Ermanno Malagutti. A CD series dedicated to the clarinet was recorded for the AGORA label with concertos by Stamitz, Backofen, Devienne, Telemann, Tausch, Hoffmeister, Krommer and Mendelssohn. On a CD of sonatas for clarinet and piano on the same label, Pacitti can be heard performing works by Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Nino Rota and Leonard Bernstein. For RICORDI he has recorded a CD with compositions by Giacomo Mazzoni (Dieci versi di Emily Dickinson, Ode e Scene per il Doktor Faustus). As conductor and clarinettist in one person, Pacitti has recorded with the Orchestra della Radio e Televisione Moldava Contemplaciòn y Danza op. 15 by Astor Piazzolla (European premiere), the Clarinet Concerto by Aaron Copland, the Sonata for Clarinet and Piano by Carlos Guastavino (European premiere) and Three Pieces for Clarinet solo by Igor Stravinsky. As conductor of the string orchestra Archi della Scala, he recorded the Piano Concerto K. 271 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and the Concerto No.2 for Violoncello by Joseph Haydn with the first cellist of La Scala, Sandro Laffranchini. For the producer MYTO RECORDS, he has recorded Cavalleria Rusticana and Il Mistero by the composer Domenico Monleone with the orchestra of the Tirana Opera House.
Pacitti has been in contact with Argentinian folk music since childhood and draws from it for his own compositions. He adapts Bizet's Carmen in the style of tango and South American folk music; this opera ballet is staged in Italy in 2006.
His Concierto Criollo for violin is performed by the Italian violinist Giovanni Angeleri (Primo Premio Paganini 1997) in Buenos Aires, Córdoba and Paraná (Argentina) in 2011.
A cycle of chamber music by Pacitti is performed in Berlin: a Concierto Criollo for violin and piano, a Concierto Criollo for viola and piano and the suite La Cruz del Sur for flute and piano.
Pacitti's symphonic version of Misa Criolla and Navidad Nuestra by Ariel Ramírez is premiered in Budapest at the Sala Béla Bartók with over 400 choral singers.
His first mass La Cruz del Sur for soli, choir and instrumental ensemble is performed in December 2015 in the Matthäuskirche in Berlin.
On the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the Lutheran Reformation, Pacitti composes the Luther Oratorio, which is premiered under his direction in June 2017 at the Philharmonie in Berlin.
In November 2017, his Cantico delle Creature, a hymn of praise on a text by St. Francis of Assisi, is premiered in Berlin.
As a child and teenager, Pacitti studied the bandoneon in Argentina with the maestros Alberto Huser, Osvaldo Montes, Alberto Garralda and Rodolfo "Cholo" Montironi, and later in Paris with Maestro Cesar Stroscio. He attends the Civica Scuola di Musica in Milan and receives lessons in electronic music and jazz. Pacitti plays with the jazz musician Franco Cerri and his quartet and performs with jazz formations at the Mamas Club in Ravenna and the Blue Note in Milan. In various formations with different programmes he plays tango, fusion, jazz, South American folklore and classical music.
Together with the bandoneon master Montironi, he closes the season of the Orquesta Sinfónica de Santa Fé in 2010 with a symphonic tango concert. He performs the Misa Tango by Luis Bacalov with the Coro Filarmonico Rossini in Pesaro and the Misa a Buenos Aires by Martín Palmieri with the Orchestra del Conservatorio di Parma.
Pacitti performs in Milan at Sala Verdi del Conservatorio and Teatro Dal Verme, in Trieste at Teatro Lirico and in various halls in Argentina, Italy, Switzerland, Croatia, Slovenia, Sweden, Denmark, Poland and Germany.
Since 2013 Pacitti has presented his project "The German Bandoneon" in Berlin with a series of concerts of sacred and profane music from Bach to Piazzolla. Together with opera singers, he performs repertoire from the 17th century and Italian bel canto.
He has been a member of the music ensemble of the Atze Music Theatre in Berlin and has played bandoneon in productions in Berlin and on tour in Germany.
He was director of the con-brio Choir Fürstenwalde in Brandenburg and the Lichtenrader Choir in Berlin.
Pacitti is director of the Chamber Choir Wedding and the RiPiTiKi Choir in Berlin.
Since August 2023, Pacitti has been conductor of the 1st Brandenburg Guard Wind Corps in Fürstenwalde/Brandenburg.