Roberto Catalano/MUSICaNTICA's Page

My Role

Artist

My Discipline(s)

Music, Visual Arts, Culinary Arts

About Me And My Work

Roberto Catalano was born in Catania, Sicily, where he began his music career as a self-taught guitarist in 1973. He is a scholar, a teacher, a composer, and a multi-instrumentalist holding a Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology from UCLA. His academic interest range from the music of Mediterranean cultures to jazz. He has lectured in major universities such as UCLA, UC Riverside, and Cal Poly Pomona, among several others. As a guitarist he has performed with different ensembles in major cities such as Rome, London, Vancouver, Seattle, and Los Angeles. He has opened for major jazz artists such as guitarist Jim Hall and pianist Michel Petrucciani and played with accomplished musicians such as the jazz guitarist John Scofield. As an arranger he has written scores in various contemporary genres, the most notable among these being a piece taken from the Sardinian vocal tradition known as “cantu a tenores,” and arranged for Grammy Award winner, Kronos Quartet. Roberto Catalano is a collector and maker of musical instruments, his collection amounting to about one hundred seventy instruments from all over the world. He appears on this site as a single artist as well as co-leader of MUSICaNTICA, Music and Culture from Mediterranean Italy.

Art Forms And Cultures I Would Like To Engage With

At its best should be with musicians, multi-instrumentalists from the Mediterranean but it would be equally a dream to collaborate with people who are great improvisers as well as culturally aware of the greatness of the oral tradition in general. Finally, any artist of good will would be welcomed.

My Creative Influences & Favorite Artists

My influences go from Beethoven in my childhood and Italian popular singers of the late 1950s-early 1960s. Then The Beatles, The Stones, Cream, Jimi Hendrix, 1960s American Folk revival, Neil Young, Dylan, CSN&Y, Mississippi Delta Bluesmen, 1970s West Coast sound and the Woodstock Generation, Aretha Franklin, Etta James, James Brown, Otis Redding, Brazilian music, Joao Gilberto, Elis Regina, Baden Powell, Vinicius De Moraes, A. C. Jobim, Cesar Camargo Mariano, Wes Montgomery, George Benson, Miles Davis, Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane, Jim Hall, Pat Metheny, the oral tradition of southern Italy, Sardinian music, Near Eastern and North African music, Farid al Atrache, Munir Bachir, Ali J. Racy, Omou Sangare, Ravi Shankar, and the list may go on a while.

My Artistic Affiliations

The Music Center of Los Angeles; The Society for Ethnomusicology

My Web link

http://www.musicantica.org