Paolo Catenaccio (1998) is a curious and dynamic musician who loves to share his ideas and to work on new projects. His expressive and lyrical music attempts to deeply communicate his artistic vision of reality, confident in the power and role of Art in the world and history. Convinced that exchange and open-mindedness should be at the center of every musician’s life who wants to grow and improve, he is constantly studying new music, trying to learn as much as possible and “steal” what can be most useful to his expressive need, but never losing sight of his own intimate and personal compositional voice. He loves to work closely with performers, trying to build a long-term artistic relationship.
His works have been performed at some of the most important institutions and festivals, in Italy and also in other countries, such as Austria, UK, Estonia, China, Montenegro. He has received commissions from leading ensembles, chamber groups, soloists and festivals such as Accademia Filarmonica Romana, ORT – Orchestra della Toscana, I tramonti di Tinia, PianoLab festival, PianoSofia festival, Ensemble Forma Libera and many others. In 2022 he was chosen, as one of the best students of Italian conservatories, to be part of a special jury of students at the Biennale Musica with the task of awarding the prize for best performance and best composition. He has publications with several music publishers, including Da Vinci Publishing, Sconfinarte and Ermes 404.
As a pianist he performs his own extemporaneous improvisations born in that moment, sharing with the audience a very intimate moment of his composition world. Indeed, Paolo has developed the art of improvisation in his daily compositional research on the piano: each of his works stems from close contact with the piano and the search for compositional ideas by improvising on the instrument. Therefore, every concert becomes a “compositional creation” that is born and dies during the performance, creating a close relationship with the audience, the hall and the piano that will influence the very outcome of the improvisation and of the concert itself.
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He founded in Minturno, his hometown, the chamber music festival ‘Suoni Oltre Confine‘, for which he served as artistic director. The goal of the season was to bring classical music to a place where it had never been, giving space to young musicians and especially young composers. The challenge was to show that even audiences not used to this kind of music can fill the halls with concerts that features contemporary music alongside the classics: indeed, the first season hosted also the Italian premieres of composers such as Adès and Saariahoo, as well as the world premiere of a composer under 30. The first season averaged 230 people per concert, thus demonstrating the interest in the project by the citizens of Minturno.
In 2025, he founded a music media project, ‘Crashendo‘, with the aim of creating a space dedicated to the dissemination of classical music by building a varied and engaging editorial plan to reconnect with the today’s audience. A space for sharing ideas and experimentation, to find a new way of making music together, addressing the urgent challenges facing the sector. The project is a horizontal platform that includes social content, vodcasts, television products, events, and much more.
