Pietro Grossi was trained as a violoncellist and composer. The present opportunity offers us the chance to listen to his early instrumental works and to consider the exemplary coherence which characterized his development throughout the following years. His interest was in the sound’s vibration in time, a horizontal idea of the use of sound which concentrates our attention at times on simple resonances, at times on sine waves, in the search for sound histograms which, most likely, came from his experience as a violoncellist. In fact, he had a constant tension towards perfect intonation – also in the use of microtones – and a full vibrato in the production of the sound. His rapport with the violoncello tended towards a new objectivity which makes one think of Alfredo Casella, certainly not of the long romantic season during which the instrument was compared to the vox umana.
His encounter with electronic music and, later, with the computer, stimulated an exponential growth of his potential while his confrontation with the evolving technological possibilities constantly enraptured him. This brought him, even, to conceive of a listening library electronically elaborating and archiving masterworks of the past, a music deposit for the successive generations.
Live Recording at Sala da Ballo del Fiorino, Galleria d’Arte Moderna, Palazzo Pitti, Florence 9 October 2010 Recording and Mastering: Mauro Forte, Tommaso Leonetti, Francesco Baldi Artistic Director: Daniele Lombardi 2010 Fondazione ATOPOS