This book is not a biography, nor a technical-artistic analysis of Rossini’s work. It is rather the result of a lifetime of enthusiastic cohabitation with the composer and the desire to spread the word about him. It is also an occasion to translatelong experience into useful suggestions for understanding and interpreting his works. Thus, it is a book both for musicians, who will find advice and reflections useful for taking on the Rossini repertory, and for listeners fascinated by thiscomposer, who is so easy to approach, but so difficult to understand.Alberto Zedda (Milan, January 2, 1928—Pesaro, March 6, 2017) was among the most important architects of the Rossini Renaissance. Through his work as a musicologist and his indefatigable conducting of Rossini’s operas worldwide, he became acharismatic advocate of the composer from Pesaro. Zedda was Artistic Director of the Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro and Honorary President of the German Rossini Society.