I was born into a musical family, and it is from my parents that I received my first music teachings, and I also owe to them the choice of the horn itself: my father is a oboist and my mother a pianist, but they had a soft spot for the horn, for its sound and its repertoire (in particular Brahms’ Trio Op. 40) and their recommendation to try was the beginning of my journey.

I started playing the horn when I was seven, and from the very beginning I could immediately attend and breathe the air of an international music festival: the “Estate Musicale a Portogruaro”, which takes place in my hometown, gave me the rare fortune to begin with Ifor James as a mentor, and I still treasure the sheets of music paper where he wrote some very simple exercises and pieces for horn and piano for me. Among my subsequent teachers, the most important ones were G. Corti, E. Terwilliger, A. Corsini, M. Maskuniitty, L. Seeman, and G. Arvati, my teacher at the Conservatory of Udine where I graduated in 2003 with the highest marks and honours.

I attended conservatory and high school in the same years, and I finished both courses in the same summer: after school I used to take the train to Udine (which was a fun to a “trainlover” like me, and not a burden) and to come back in the evening with my father, oboe teacher at the conservatory.

At the beginning of the fourth year, I participated in my first great orchestral experience: two weeks in Bremen playing Berlioz’s “Fantastic Symphony” with a youth orchestra, and in those days I suddenly realized that my whole time was dedicated to music and I had the epiphany that made me think: “This is what I want to do.” 

My orchestral training continued with the Italian Youth Orchestra and at the Texas Music Festival, and after that, I started working at Teatro Verdi in Trieste and at Teatro La Scala in Milan. Since 2008, I’ve been principal solo horn of the “Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia”. In my orchestral experience, as well as collaborating with renowned orchestras in the international scene including London Symphony Orchestra, Lucerne Festival Orchestra and Mozart Orchestra, I had the pleasure of playing with L. Maazel, C. Abbado, G. Pretre, V. Gergiev, D. Harding, and other great conductors. 

In my musical life teaching is also very important, and I learn a lot from this activity which I dedicate myself to as horn teacher at the “I Fiati” class of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia and at Conservatorio C. Pollini in Padua, in addition to Master Classes in Europe, Asia, and South America.

As horn player of the Italian Wonderbrass Quintet, of the “Quintetto di Fiati Italiano” and of the Opter Ensemble, I took part in important festivals and concert seasons all over the world.

These years of chamber music festivals, left an imprint on me, and the chamber music repertoire is the context where today I still fell musically at home and of which I like everything: the way to work, the repertoire, the opportunity to play in groups of all kinds, ranging from the wind quintet to the mixed ensemble, the environment you create in small groups, always meeting with new artists and, finally, the opportunity to do research in order to make the public discover less-known music, as important as the most famous masterpieces. For example, in “French Music for horn and piano”, Federico Lovato and I recorded for the first time J. M. Damase’s Sonata, and the Opter Ensemble performs D. Zanettovich and F. Francescato’s exclusive arrangements of J. Brahms’s Serenade op. 11 by and R. Strauss’s “Till Eulenspiegels”, and there is also the collaboration with composers for the creation of new repertoire, for duo, for trio, and for horn and orchestra.

And finally, whenever I can, I take refuge between the peaks and paths of my beloved Dolomites, or I go out for a run to train for the next marathon, or I study a bit of Mathematics, for which I have a passion equal to that I have for music and which I studied at the University of Padua where I graduated from.

Download: