Conductor and composer trained in Chile.

Born in 1878, in Turin (Italy), was the son of the operatic bass Antonio Padovani, and of his wife Angela Remorini;brother of the musicians Arturo Padovani, orchestra conductor, and Adelina Padovani, a soprano.

He arrived to Chile at the age of seven, and entered the Conservatorio Nacional de Música y Declamación de Santiago de Chile, and he received conducting classes from Federico Stöber, and composition with Luigi Stefano Giarda and Enrique Soro. He graduated in harmony and composition in 1905, together with other students like the pianist Amelia Cocq, or the violinists José Varalla and Julio Guerra.

He started his career as composer of operettas and zarzuelas with titles like "Valparaíso alegre" (1903) or "Almanaque chileno" (1907), written with Aníbal Aracena. He conducted concerts across the world, and visited the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona several times. There, on 18 January 1916, he premiered the one-act lyric drama "Tassarba" by Enric Morera, featuring soprano Elsa Raccanelli, mezzo-soprano Elena Lucci, tenor Jaume Illa and baritone Josep Segura. Other operas that he conducted at the Catalan hall were "La Dolores" by Tomás Bretón in 1915; "I Pagliacci" by Ruggero Leoncavallo in 1916; "Il barbiere di Siviglia" by Gioachino Rossini and "Marina" by Emilio Arrieta in 1922; "Madama Butterfly" by Giacomo Puccini; "Carmen" by Georges Bizet in 1928; and "Las golondrinas" by José María Usandizaga in 1934. He also conducted the premiere of José Mauri's "La esclava", at the Teatro Nacional in Havana on 6 June 1921. Writing from Milan on 5 April 1929, Padovani informed Manuel de Falla that Pedro Darosa had hired him to conduct "El amor brujo" (1915) and "El retablo de maese Pedro" (1919-1923), at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires. With this in mind, he asked the composer to send any pertinent musical indications and as many details as possible about the previous performances in Paris. On 11 October 1930, he conducted Jules Massenet's "Thaïs" at the grand opening of the Teatro Municipal de Viña del Mar. The Orquesta Sinfónica Municipal de Santiago reached its highest level of excellence under his baton. He passed away at the age of 60 in Ancona (Italy) in April 1939.

El Centro de Documentación de las Artes Escénicas de Chile reúne un conjunto de documentos relativos a la actividad artística de la familia Padovani.