Giulio castagnoli

Castagnoli, Giulio(Rome, 22 Nov 1958). Italian composer. In 1982 he took his diploma in piano (with Maria Golia) and composition (with Gilberto Bosco) at the Turin Conservatory, and in 1983 he graduated in humanities and philosophy from Turin University. He subsequently studied with Brian Ferneyhough (Musikhochschule Freiburg, 1983--6) and Franco Donatoni (Accademia di S. Cecilia, Rome, 1987). In 1984 he was appointed to teach composition at the Turin Conservatory, and from 1999 at the city university as well. He was composer in residence in Berlin, a guest of the DAAD (1998--9).

He worked on music education with Sergio Liberovici whose unfinished opera Malzel he orchestrated with Luciano Berio in 1995. Like Giacinto Scelsi, Castagnoli employs a sophisticated style directed towards timbral inventiveness, and it was to Scelsi that Castagnoli dedicated not only his first orchestral work Klang, but also an analytical essay for the series Quaderni di Musica Nuova which he founded in 1987.

Compositions

His anthropological conception of music, as the archetypal voice of every civilization, has drawn him towards the primitive symbols of all cultures (in Numeri), and has attracted him to oriental thought (Sei Haiku, Tre poesie T'ang). This conception has also had an effect on his explorations of timbre, made through unusual combinations and which includes the use of early instruments, and is the inspiration behind his rediscovery of modality. He is interested in interactions between music and visual art (Al museo), while his electronic pieces explore the changing state of the acoustic material (Isole). Luciano Berio commisioned to him his Concerto per Violoncello e Doppia Orchestra, for Santa Cecilia 2002 - - 3 concert season in Rome.

Short Discography

*"Giulio Castagnoli" (disco monografico), CD Adda Records (1990)
*"Al Museo in volo & a zompi" (opera buffa completa), CD Nuova Fonit Cetra (1991)
*"900 Musica - Elision Ensemble", CD RCA BGM/Ariola (1992)
*"Giulio Castagnoli" (disco monografico), CD Stradivarius (2000)
*"LmcsL Messa", CD Stradivarius (2001)