Ivan Ziraldo was born in Udine in 1973. He began to play the classical guitar at the age of 13 under the guidance of maestro Graziano Lauzana and at the age of 16 he started performing in public with the classical guitar. Over the following years he dabbled in many musical genres and also developed a great passion for flamenco. In 1992 he attended a musical course at the Lizard in Florence under the guidance of Giovanni Untenberger, Fabrizio del Salvo and Gianni Zei, where he studied finger-picking with all its variations and styles. Here he also took his first steps in the world of jazz. When he completed his studies at the Lizard, he took part in a number of musical seminars, the most important of which was with Pat Metheny. In this period Ivan formed a jazz trio playing Pat Metheny tracks and jazz standards. The group is still active today.
In the meantime Ivan played with various classical orchestras and rock groups until the formation in 1993 of the group Siddharta, a three-piece instrumental group (Ivan Ziraldo on the guitar, Gianluca Caroli on the bass and Raffaele Talliente on the drums) playing original jazz fusion music. Numerous concerts in the local area and an enthusiastic reception from the general public led the trio to produce an album “Dialogue with an Alien” with which they participated in a variety of radio programmes including the national Italian radio RAI. In 1999 the group took a long pause and eventually disolved because of the the individual members’ various commitments. In 2000, however, the group reformed briefly when it was called upon to collaborate in a local concert with the reknowned international bass player and owner of the Space Academy in London, Keith ‘the Missile’ Bailey (Gong – Here and Now).
In 1990 Ivan Ziraldi started on his career as a music teacher, firstly teaching classical guitar and later adding all the other techniques from electric guitar to jazz. He teaches in many schools in the local area where he has also formed with his pupils an orchestra, the “Rhaula Orchestral Group” and a guitar group, the “Rhaula Electric Band”. The two groups play music of all genres (Pat Metheny, Al Di Meola, Mahavisnu Orchestra, Joe Satriani, Frank Zappa ecc.) in which, naturally enough, the guitar is the belle of the ball. The groups still play today in many local festivals. In 2007, for the tenth anniversary of the two groups, the Rhaula Guitar Festival was organised with numerous invited musicians. Ivan’s pupils played ‘The Way Up’ (Pat Metheny) and ‘Hot Rats’ (Frank Zappa) with great success.
In 2005, together with Andrea Casaccio and Dario Lorenzo, Ivan formed the group “Horus” playing original acoustic compositions. In 2007 Horus produced the album “Mantrayana” and Andrea Casaccio left the group to be replaced by Alessandro Floreali. At the same time Ivan started playing Argentinian and Spanish compositions with the singer Eleonora Sensidoni.
Ivan is also known for his solo performances and is currently working on the production of a solo album due to be released in September 2007.
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Ivan Ziraldo is a member of IMIsound
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