At 21 years only, Guido Ponzini is a virtuoso master of the Chapman Stick. His compositions between progressive rock, neo-classic, Italian folklore and world are as diversified as his playing.

14 MP3 Songs
ROCK: Progressive Rock, NEW AGE: Ambient



Details:
"Makes the Chapman stick sound as easy to learn as a recorder in kindergarten.
There is a point where incredible technical savvy and the ability to touch listenerâs heart in a very simple and direct way converge. Whenever that happens, you know you have something special..." Tobias Fischer, Tokafi

Guido Ponzini: News from an Imaginary World
Clear and pure is the sound of the Chapman Stick, provided a virtuoso like Guido Ponzini knows how to coax it out of this fretted string instrument. Born in 1985 in Manerbio, Italy, the enthusiastic and adventurous musician, an expert in atmospheric-epic sound sequences, shows us on his solo debut album that even a dream-dancer like himself neednât shy the limits in world music.
âTwilight Townâ documents Ponziniâs foray into an imaginary world in which he combines the mists of Avalon (âAvalonâ), a rainstorm over the harbour (âRainstorm Upon The Harbourâ), and the sound of hammering from the depths of a coal mine (âHammers Upon The Coal Mineâ) into a meditative sound experience. Guido Ponzini, enjoying the special support of his colleague Giovanni Amighetti, with whom he studied composition in Mailand, bundles his experience, his filigrane technique and his art of improvisation into a succession of songs which feeds on the elements of classical Italian folklore, neo-classic, world, progressive rock and ambient.
Alone or in partnership with Amighetti and Guo Yue â the Realworld artist and flute guru from China (worked on the soundtracks Killing Fields and The Last Emperor) â he creates soundscapes which find their expression in solo escapades, duet cascades (with Amighetti) or quartet experiments (Amighetti, Yue and singer Luisa Cottifogli). Carried by impressive calm and expressive passion, the stick and bass lines Ponzini creates with the electric and acoustic bass are simply celestial.
The composition techniques applied are extremely different, representing a suspenseful discourse through the times and the regions of the world. Austere guitar passages combined with electronic sequences and tricky loops to create musical paintings which appear as impressionistic landscapes. Dramatic events are spookily implied in the spherically graceful âEncounterâ. Full of relish and almost gloating, thatâs how the two-part song âThe Bearâ sounds, with the bear licking its wounds after a painful encounter with a swarm of bees, while the âSnow Templeâ tracks reveal dramatic darkness and flute-elated ease accompanying the change of the seasons.
Actually the title âTwilight Townâ is misleading; besides daringly dramatic soundworks, Guido Ponziniâs city and landscape impressions, which smack of relaxation and liberating ease, easily outweigh.