BIOGRAPHY

Gianpaolo Antongirolami, a saxophone player, has an intense musical career, offering a repertoire strongly focused on modern and contemporary music, experimental music, electronics, and improvisation.

He performs as a soloist, often with electronics, and in various chamber groups, collaborating with musicians of the caliber of Roberto Fabbriciani, Garth Knox, Butch Morris, Terry Riley, Giancarlo Schiaffini, Mike Svoboda, Stefano Scodanibbio, Horacio Vaggione, and Alvise Vidolin. He has performed at major festivals such as Festival Synthèse de Bourges, InterActions (Bangor, UK), Milano Musica, Nuova Consonanza (Rome), Festival Angelica (Bologna), Unerhörte Musik (Berlin), Passages - Centro d'Arte in Padova, Nachtstrom (Basel), and Fondazione Cini (Venice).

He is an appreciated performer - "A very talented soloist [...] a great virtuoso and a great scholar" (Il Manifesto) – and a tireless promoter of the contemporary repertoire, thanks to an "absolutely extraordinary technique" (All About Jazz) and his choice of "a memorable program, of great quality, much appreciated by the large audience, capable of surprising, intriguing, and attracting without ever boring or unsettling" - Gianpaolo's performances have the ability to "bring the public, even the less accustomed, closer to the harshness of the avant-garde" (Cronache Maceratesi), "demonstrating in an impressive manner the qualities of the saxophone in New Music" (Badische Zeitung).

Since the 1990s, he has been deeply involved in the world of electroacoustic music, both as a researcher and performer, working closely with leading composers on the international scene and performing at renowned festivals such as Festival Synthèse de Bourges, InterActions (Bangor, UK), CIM - Colloquium of Computer Music (Florence, Udine, Cagliari, Ancona), Spaziomusica (Cagliari), MA/IN (Matera), and Acusmatiq (Ancona). He also served as the artistic director of the XXIII CIM (Ancona, 2022).
In 1998, to celebrate Karlheinz Stockhausen's seventieth birthday, he collaborated with Eugenio Giordani to create a version for saxophone and live electronics (Kyma/Capybara) of the composition SOLO no. 19. This work was presented to the scientific community at the La Terra Fertile conference (later published in the Proceedings of the La Terra Fertile Conference, L'Aquila, 1998), performed in concert, and recorded on Elettroacustica 2 - Corpi del Suono (Ars Publica, 1998). The concert program was included in the list of "celebrations" on Stockhausen's official website.

Until 2017, he played with the Alea Saxophone Quartet, whose musical activity culminated in the release of the CD Arvo Pärt - Anima (col legno, 2017). The CD Anima-which contains the complete compositions for saxophone quartet by the Estonian composer-was immediately well-received by the public, garnering over 450,000 streams by 2020, just three years after its release. Critics also praised it: "Anima is an extraordinary album. The splendid transcriptions are ennobled by rare execution that enhances their timbral characteristics to the point that I would say this album represents the closest experience to the essence of Pärt's music ever published so far [...]. Among the best of the year, one of the most beautiful records of my life" (P. Ronchetti, Mescalina).

Since founding the Sidera Saxophone Quartet in 2020, Gianpaolo has been playing with the ensemble: "The Sidera Saxophone Quartet honors its name both in terms of reaching stellar regions and in truly superior excellence" (M. Gamba, Il Manifesto). Strongly committed to promoting contemporary repertoire, the quartet has received numerous dedications, including Quadrangoli d'Autunno by Salvatore Sciarrino-commissioned with the support of the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation-and Improvviso Statico III by Carmine Emanuele Cella, for saxophone quartet and augmented percussion.
In 2022, the Sidera Saxophone Quartet released Koinè - Musica contemporanea italiana per quartetto di saxofoni (Ema Vinci), "a recording that is literally a door to elsewhere" (Nazim Comunale, Blow Up Magazine). Koinè was recognized as one of the best CDs of 2022, appearing in the Top 5 Recordings of the Year by Il Manifesto newspaper, in the A List of Musical References for 2022 selection in Percorsi Musicali, and in the 2022 Playlist of Blow Up Magazine.

Gianpaolo is also part of the Antongirolami-Selva duo, which, in its 10 years of activity, has offered a rich repertoire spanning multiple genres. "First of all, it's clear that Antongirolami and Selva play like gods. Clear, lucid, and relaxed. Think of how many great interpreters of so-called 'art' music there are out there, and how few people know them" (M. Gamba).

Driven by strong musical curiosity and a desire to expand the saxophone repertoire, Gianpaolo has premiered more than a hundred compositions, many of which were dedicated to him, and has released numerous CDs (col legno, Brilliant Classics, among others). A Selmer-Paris artist, he teaches saxophone at the Fermo Conservatory of Music in Italy.






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