The Italian conductor Carlo Maria Giulini died in Brescia in June 2005, at the age of 91. Giulini began studying the viola, composition and conducting at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome in 1930. In addition to actively participating in chamber music, he performed in orchestras under conductors like Richard Strauss, Wilhelm Furtwängler, Bruno Walter and Otto Klemperer. Those experiences led him to decide to become a conductor.

He began broadcasting work (RAI) in 1946 and became conductor of the Milan Radio Orchestra when it was formed in 1950. Arturo Toscanini discovered him a year later. But a glamorous career was not really what Giulini wanted, and the very few permanent posts he held with orchestras include those with the Philharmonia Orchestra in London, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra.

He was a conductor of rigorous authority, virtuosic and completely to the point. His stringency caused his repertoire to be relatively small. His marked perfectionist tendency and aversion to glamorous appearances earned him the loving epithet "Holy Carlo". He always saw himself as a "servant of music".