Salvi was born in Botta di Sedrina (Provincia di Bergamo), Italy. A student of Gaetano Donizetti, he is best known for having completed the score of Donizetti’s unfinished opera Le duc d’Albe for its first public performance in 1882, some forty years after Donizetti’s death. (The libretto was translated into Italian, and the opera was performed as Il duca d’Alba.) Salvi is usually credited as the composer of the tenor aria “Angelo casto e bel” in Il duca d’Alba, although as he was helped in the reconstruction of Donizetti’s score by several composers, including Amilcare Ponchielli, there has been some dispute as to the degree to which he was the aria’s sole composer.[2] He died in Rieti, Italy.
^This date for Salvi’s death is given in Donati-Petteni, G., 1930 and Stieger, F., 1977. However, the date given in Altmann, W. and Frank, P., 1936 is 18 November 1887
