Massimo Di Gesu is an Italian composer, born in 1970.
At the Milan Conservatory Di Gesu attained the Diploma in Piano in 1992, and the Diploma in Composition in 1995. He studied composition with Bruno Bettinelli,[1] and piano with Anita Porrini, one of Cortot's and Benedetti Michelangeli's pupils.[2] Besides further piano studies with Valerio Premuroso, he attended post-graduate composition courses at the Petrassi Academy (Parma), at the University of Central England (Birmingham), and at the University of Leeds.[3]
His approach to composition (alien to fashionable currents,[4] and based on a distinctly atonal harmonic idiom[3]) focuses on the symbols hidden in the syntax of sounds,[5][6] being his language characterised by the search for a perceptible principle of attraction[7] linking the elements of the musical narrative.[2][4]
Di Gesu's debut at La Scala Theatre took place in May 2013, when La Scala String Quartet premiered his "Verdigo",[8][9] [10] a work which the ensemble had commissioned on the occasion of the bicentennial of Giuseppe Verdi's birth. La Scala String Quartet had already played Di Gesu's works such as "Ansikte mot ansikte" (for Serate Musicali - Milano, and Ente Concerti Pesaro[11]) and "WOLFiliGrANG" (at the Rovereto Mozart Festival[12]).
In 2014 the Teatro La Fenice (Venice) commissioned from him "Luci d'estate" which was premiered by the Ex Novo Ensemble in July of the same year.[13][14]
Other artistic partners of Di Gesu's are
Poems by Di Gesu, such as “La vita è un sogno”[19] and “Al giardino”,[20] have been recited by Maria Brivio and Federika Brivio within the radio broadcast, Diamo l’Abbrivio.[21]
Computer-based drawings of his appear on the cover of the CD “PianOLYPHONY”[15] recorded by Peter Bradley-Fulgoni (Foxglove Audio - FOX091), and in the score of “Geometria di un diletto” (edition db).[2][4][5][3]