Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Alessandro Solbiati writes of his new release, “Novus”: “Surveying the list of what I have composed in the field of chamber music to this, one will note the coexistence of often contrasting apititudes, preferences, 'affections': that for particularly 'classic' ensemble on the hand (string quartet or trio, piano trio etc.) and the insistent, repeated use of instruments very different from one other (the cimbalom, 52 Thai gongs, the viola d'amore, even the reconstruction of a barbiton, an Ancient Greek instrument, or Pinuccio Sciola's pietre sonore); or, from the formal point of view, the series of very short one-part pieces (the Interludi for the piano, for example), which favor the force of invention, and on the other much more formal and complex structures, which are based on confidence in the possibility of continuous and 'narrative' development of images, and of musical material.”

Eric Maestri, born in 1980, has a trajectory toward composition that is equal parts expected and unexpected. The former includes formal education in Brescia and Turin, then Strasbourg, with additional training in Paris. The latter includes a detour into philosophy in Turin and span of six years, in his 20s when he was not active at all in composition. One already gets the sense from these basic facts that he is a composer critical of every move and a man with much more to offer than a mere experience in sound. His experience in realms far beyond music have left an indelible mark on the sensations that he decides to turn into music.

Joyce's Ulysses is something more than a common thread linking the four words by Patrizio Esposito recorded here: it is actually the prime source, the very root of the compositional action. ‘Shut your eyes and see': Joyce's approach, which is Esposito's inspiration, is precisely such 'singing with one's ears'. As is well known, Joyce in his youth aspired to a career as a tenor, played the piano, and composed: he was always keen on music and it has been calculated that his works conceal thousands of references to the world of music and its protagonists. In Ulysses, in particular, he not only makes explicit mention of genuine pieces of music, from Gregorian Chant to Handel, Mozart and Verdi, right down to songs and nursery rhymes (in the penultimate chapter there is even a tune on a musical staff), but also interweaves his lines with the noise and sounds of daily life, which are continually represented as onomatopoetic phonemes.