“Vittorio Baravalle” Civic Music Institute of Fossano

The Civic Music Institute of Fossano was founded in 1974 as an isolated department of the ‘B. Bruni’ Public Music Institute of Cuneo. In 1976 it was declared independent and named after Vittorio Baravalle, a composer from Fossano, who lived between the 19th and the 20th century.

The growing interest in the culture of music by the citizens of Fossano, and the fact that many of the students attending the Bruni Institute in Cuneo were from either Fossano or its neighbourhood, were the two main reasons that Burgos Palace was made the stable seat of Baravalle Institute. Two more detached departments were established in the towns of Bra and Alba which then became independent at the end of the 1980s.
The first management advisor for the Institute was Master Giovanni Mosca, who managed the school for ten consecutive years, plus three more years after the break which saw Master Guglielmo Antoniotti as the manager of the institute. Then came Professor Piero Quaglia, followed by Professor Ubaldo Rosso who were both musicians from Savigliano.
Since 1999 Master Gianpiero Brignone has been the artistic director of the school. Gianpiero Brignone is a musician from Fossano who actually started his artistic education as a student at the “Vittorio Baravalle” Music Institute.

The Music Institute has achieved some very impressive goals over the last few years. It boasts more than 750 subscriptions of students who attend classes regularly; which places it among the most prominent civic music schools in Piedmont, proving to be the best one of all. This excellent result has been reached thanks to the preparation and the professionalism of its teaching staff that are organised by a thorough teaching programme which has developed an educational offer focussing on the universal values and features of Music. The music language, together with its wide heritage coming from the various geographical and cultural areas, turns out to be the most suitable means of communication to create harmony between worlds which seem to have very little in common.

The discovery of specific similarities and differences of music traditions plays a crucial role in improving cultural integration, consolidating the respect towards different cultures and ethnic groups. Moreover, music and its linguistic development have always had some important and decisive connections with other literary, scientific and historical disciplines. Due to its very own nature therefore, musical education needs an appropriate interdisciplinary method, since it is in constant relation to other fields of knowledge. Nevertheless, beside this awareness the place of musical education in the Italian curriculum was set aside, creating a void in the development of education as a whole that ‘V. Baravalle’ Institute is able to fill.

Our school aims to encourage the appreciation and the enhancement of a complete musical education. We aim to contribute to the shaping and development of the artistic feeling and culture in young generations but also in adults, in the development of each and every person that attends our courses.

Notably one of the most remarkable goals achieved by the school, is the number of students that after studying with us, gain their diploma and go on to successfully begin, and excel in, their profession.
Also, an added value of the service offered by the school, are the Master courses held by internationally famous and prestigious teachers, which are funded by Fondazione CRF (Savings Bank of Fossano) and by the Culture Councillorship of Fossano.
Every year since 1995, these courses have completed and enriched the ordinary courses, helping to consolidate the quality of the teaching offered at our school, and also to introduce the town of Fossano to the rest of the world.