Giuseppe Mazzamuto: Melodyterranean

Giuseppe Mazzamuto is a percussionist, vibraphonist, composer and arranger from Palermo. He graduated in percussion at the city’s Vincenzo Bellini Conservatory with top marks, honours and an honourable mention. Early in his career he worked as a timpanist and percussionist with the Italian Youth Orchestra, collaborating with conductors including Carlo Maria Giulini, Daniele Gatti, Giuseppe Sinopoli and Eliahu Inbal. He performed with major Italian musical institutions, including the Teatro Regio di Torino, La Fenice in Venice, the Teatro Comunale di Bologna and the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, and achieved high placings in orchestral auditions. His work with the Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana began in 1998.

In 2012 he attended a jazz course at Berklee College of Music with Gary Burton, who acknowledged his abilities in a letter of recommendation. He played drums on Giuseppe Vasapolli’s soundtrack for The Bright Side (2013), directed by Sarah Wilson Thacker, a film whose distinctions include the ASC Student Heritage Award, the Hollywood Film Festival and an Emmy nomination.

His work ranges from classical music to pop and jazz, with national and international tours as a drummer and vibraphonist, including appearances at the Macao International Music Festival and WOMAD. His collaborators include Sting, Ute Lemper, Sarah Jane Morris, Mike Stern and Luis Bacalov. He has also worked as a percussionist with choreographers Carolyn Carlson and David Parsons.

He has composed for choir, orchestra, percussion, jazz ensembles and brass. In 2008 he wrote and performed the concerto for vibraphone and orchestra Mary and Son, commissioned for the fiftieth anniversary of the Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana; the work received favourable attention in Drums and Percussion. With Filippo Cottone he composed the music for Giuseppe Sicari’s musical Father Joe, presented at the Teatro Brancaccio in Rome in 2008. In 2011 he wrote the percussion music for Dal fuoco al fuoco at the Greek Theatre in Selinunte, with choreography by Riccardo Di Cosmo of the Rome Opera Ballet.

His subsequent projects include the soundtrack for La camera delle meraviglie (2016), music for Angelo Di Liberto’s Il bambino Giovanni Falcone at Palermo’s Teatro Politeama (2018), and a commission for the World Saxophone Congress in Zagreb in 2018. His Da Vinci Jazz album Melodyterranean brings together his quintet, guest performers and the Sicilian String Quartet.

The Sicilian String Quartet appears on Giuseppe Mazzamuto’s Melodyterranean, contributing to the album’s dialogue between jazz quintet, guest performers and strings.

On Mary Love, Quality Time, Serenity and Waltz for, its players are Luciano Saladino and Gioacchino Guddo, violins; Giuseppe Brunetto, viola; and Domenico Guddo, cello. For Bill Molenhof’s Waltz King, the violin parts are played by Gioacchino Di Stefano and Cristina Pantaleone, with Brunetto and Guddo. The string arrangements are by Alberto Maniaci, Giuseppe Mazzamuto and Giovanni Conte.

Bill Molenhof is an American percussionist and composer, born in St. Louis, Missouri. His performing activities include Jazz Winds of Patagonia, and he has worked as an opening-act drummer for Michael Jackson and the Jackson 5. He cites Bob Moses, Idris Muhammad and Warren “Baby” Dodds among his drumming influences.

His composition Waltz King is recorded on Giuseppe Mazzamuto’s Melodyterranean, in an arrangement for vibraphone and string quartet by Alberto Maniaci.

Giuseppe Mazzamuto is a percussionist, vibraphonist, composer and arranger from Palermo. He graduated in percussion at the city’s Vincenzo Bellini Conservatory with top marks, honours and an honourable mention. Early in his career he worked as a timpanist and percussionist with the Italian Youth Orchestra, collaborating with conductors including Carlo Maria Giulini, Daniele Gatti, Giuseppe Sinopoli and Eliahu Inbal. He performed with major Italian musical institutions, including the Teatro Regio di Torino, La Fenice in Venice, the Teatro Comunale di Bologna and the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, and achieved high placings in orchestral auditions. His work with the Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana began in 1998.

In 2012 he attended a jazz course at Berklee College of Music with Gary Burton, who acknowledged his abilities in a letter of recommendation. He played drums on Giuseppe Vasapolli’s soundtrack for The Bright Side (2013), directed by Sarah Wilson Thacker, a film whose distinctions include the ASC Student Heritage Award, the Hollywood Film Festival and an Emmy nomination.

His work ranges from classical music to pop and jazz, with national and international tours as a drummer and vibraphonist, including appearances at the Macao International Music Festival and WOMAD. His collaborators include Sting, Ute Lemper, Sarah Jane Morris, Mike Stern and Luis Bacalov. He has also worked as a percussionist with choreographers Carolyn Carlson and David Parsons.

He has composed for choir, orchestra, percussion, jazz ensembles and brass. In 2008 he wrote and performed the concerto for vibraphone and orchestra Mary and Son, commissioned for the fiftieth anniversary of the Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana; the work received favourable attention in Drums and Percussion. With Filippo Cottone he composed the music for Giuseppe Sicari’s musical Father Joe, presented at the Teatro Brancaccio in Rome in 2008. In 2011 he wrote the percussion music for Dal fuoco al fuoco at the Greek Theatre in Selinunte, with choreography by Riccardo Di Cosmo of the Rome Opera Ballet.

His subsequent projects include the soundtrack for La camera delle meraviglie (2016), music for Angelo Di Liberto’s Il bambino Giovanni Falcone at Palermo’s Teatro Politeama (2018), and a commission for the World Saxophone Congress in Zagreb in 2018. His Da Vinci Jazz album Melodyterranean brings together his quintet, guest performers and the Sicilian String Quartet.