Andrea Cortesi

Andrea Cortesi

Soloist, chamber muscian, artistic director, he studied with Béla Csanyi, Corrado Romano and Massimo Quarta.

Andrea Cortesi, stands out for his multifaceted musical personality and for his wide and sometimes unconventional repertoire, as well as for his committed curiosity and propensity towards the works of the most interesting composers of the last generations of which he has made numerous national and world premieres.
He is strongly interested in musical collaborations and in promoting projects moving in many different musical directions, he founded the Orchestra da Camera Millennium, the Quartetto Mosaico,Ensemble Mosaico and Collegium Tiberinum, string groups with a repertoire from Bach to nowadays.
His work put him in contact or in collaboration with many contemporary composers such as Leo Brower, Graham Fitkin, Philip Glass, Dave Heath, Ennio Morricone, Michael Nyman, Giovanni Sollima, Georgs Pelecis, Erkki-Sven Tuur, Luis Bacalov, Giya Kancheli.
He has performed in Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Malta, Georgia, Holland, USA, Japan.
Andrea Cortesi performs various composers and periods, moving among different musical identities with the aim to fill the gap between the necessities of the formal language, the technical challenges of each composition, and the final reason of every performance: convey the true spirit of each work.
He moves with ease between Bach, Schnittke, Schubert, Piazzolla, Vivaldi, Silvestrov, Schumann, Part and many more, trying to mark affinities and contrasts, even exploring new music and discovering the rarities of the present time.
He plays with pianist Marco Venturi, forming a duo with him and giving life to a challenging musical journey. They recorded the project entitled ‘LONTANISSIMO’, for the label Max Research, with pieces by Arvo Pärt, Valentin Silvestrov and Astor Piazzolla.
Again for Max Research, the second recording project in duo with Marco Venturi is entitled ‘LA MACCHINA DEL TEMPO’ (‘The Time Machine’), an album that brings toghether Alfred Schnittke and Ludwig Van Beethoven, and that has been defined by Gidon Kremer, one of the greatest violinists alive, as ‘an impressive project’
The first two CDs with Marco Venturi duo have also pioneered the international debut album with the Dutch label BRILLIANT CLASSICS, with a CD containing works by Philip Glass, Giya Kancheli,Erkki-Sven Tüür.
In 2014 he recorded the second cd for Brilliant Classics in duo with Marco Venturi, with the complete Sonatas for Violin and Piano by Robert Schumann (first italian recording of Schumann Third Sonata)
The recordings of the compositions by Tüür, Silvestrov, Kancheli and Glass appearing in the albums published by the duo Cortesi – Venturi occupy a prominent place in the world discography.
He collaborated with many groups or orchestras, often as principal first violin, and in the context of these collaborations he played with international soloists and conductors as Ennio Morricone, Yo-Yo Ma, Riccardo Muti, Julian Rachlin, Julian Kovatchev, Patrick Furnellier, Janos Furst, Salvatotre Accardo, Massimo Quarta, Alirio Diaz, Dulce Pontes, Sonig Tchakerian, Katia Ricciarelli, Steven Mercurio, Roberto Molinelli, Fratelli Mancuso, Alessandro Carbonare, Gilda Buttà, Edoardo Catemario, Raphael Wallfisch, Roberto Fabbriciani, Bruno Canino, Yuri Zhislin, Natalia Lomeiko, Enrico Bronzi, Mika Vayrynen, Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio, Maurizio Baglini, Luigi Piovano, Federico Mondelci, Emanuele Segre, Ramin Bahrami, Eva Bindere, GliarchiEnsemble, Elizabeth Wallfisch, Giorgi Zagareli, Sergey Smbatyan.
Andrea Cortesi is a versatile musician, crossing the borders into all genres, for concerts, tours, Tv shows, and recordings for both classical and contemporary music, collaborating with jazz, pop and Rock artists such as Fabrizio Bosso, Dianne Reeves, Caetano Veloso, Lionel Richie, Joe Cocker, Dionne Warwick, Liza Minnelli, Laura Pausini, Renzo Arbore, Cristina Zavalloni, Mario Biondi, Andrea Bocelli, Nile Rodgers and the Chic, Giorgio Moroder.
He collaborated with Sting, as first solo violinist, during two italian dates of his Symphonicity Tour.