BIOGRAPHY.
Pietro Ballestrero, guitar player and composer, was born in 1973 in Turin, Italy. He began studying music when he was ten years old, taking classical and jazz classes with different teachers in Italy and abroad. He attended four editions of the Siena Jazz summer courses, and master classes with Ralph Towner, John Abercrombie, Dave Liebman and others.
He lived one year in the US in 1990-91; he attended the high school senior year in Portsmouth, R.I., where he took the diploma in 1991. Back to Italy, in 1997 he graduated in Mathematics at the University of Turin.
In 2008 he took a diploma in jazz music in the "Giuseppe Verdi" Conservatory of Turin.
PROJECTS AND DISCOGRAPHY.
From 1998 Pietro Ballestrero worked in a large number of groups, as a leader or as a sideman, mostly in jazz or contemporary music. He carried on a personal research in the field of improvisation, also through experiences such as the “Permanent workshop of musical research†leaded by Stefano Battaglia, which he attended for three years, or working together with the “Lab Dance Orchestraâ€, a workshop band under the direction of Furio di Castri and Gianluca Petrella.
Always active as a composer and arranger, he played many concerts in jazz clubs and participated to important festivals such as for example “Linguaggi jazz†(2006), “Jazz & press†(2006), “Legnica International Theatre Festival†(Poland, September 2007), Lodz Christian Culture Festival (Poland, November 2007 and November 2008), "Chalon dans la rue" (France, July 2008).
Main recordings:
QFWFQ quintet, “SCARABORECCHI†(Panastudio Productions, 1999).
PIETRO BALLESTRERO quartet, “LA CASA DEGLI SPECCHIâ€, (Velut Luna 2003).
LUCIA MINETTI, “LUZ†(Velut Luna, 2004)
PIETRO BALLESTRERO, FRANCESCO SAIU group, “LINNAS†(Enthropya, 2006).
MARCO TARDITO, Oiseaux quintet (to be published).
RISSO BALLESTRERO, Kibalcic quartet (to be published).
PIETRO BALLESTRERO "PELLE" (Velut Luna, november 2008)
TEACHING ACTIVITY.
Pietro Ballestrero teaches guitar and improvisation technique at “Centro Jazz Torino†since 1999.
He also works in the summer musical courses in Perinaldo (IM, Italy).
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