Intramontes along an intense journey, both compositional and concert, that began in the 1980s, Ramberto Ciammarughi has earned an international reputation as one of the most original talents of his generation.
His unheard-of music ventures into unexplored sonic territories, as if to challenge the listener to an elsewhere whose presence can be sensed.

With his latest work Intramontes he continues to push a path beyond the boundaries of perception. The mountain, mentioned in the title, represents the metaphor of physical and sensory barriers to be overcome. As he explains “Intra montes in Latin means between mountains, but also across mountains and, in full, beyond mountains.

What is there beyond that usual but imposing stone barrier that seems to demarcate our horizon, but also our gaze and sometimes our thoughts? But not the imagination and our ability to create outside the ‘attended and predictable’. In our history, the sense of the unreachable has always been hidden in that limit. Yet, toward that unknown continue to walk all those who are not satisfied with the visible and who regard the quest as an essential part of a rich and meaningful life.”

Emblematic in this regard is the collaboration with the multifaceted and visionary musical genius of Paolo Fresu, another contemporary jazz icon. Through the fusion of multifarious influences, from classical tradition to experimental jazz, from Mediterranean folklore to contemporary sounds, the two masters shape a universal and timeless musical language.

Paolo Fresu’s trumpet “gives a lyrical and, at the same time, experimental dimension and raises the project to an even higher level of expression,” clarifies Ciammarughi himself, who also emphasizes the fundamental role of his other traveling companions, who are present on this record: “Intramontes is a work that would not have been achievable if not with a set of friends-musicians-collaborators. I am referring to the groups involved in the project and who have been present in so many of my musical and theatrical endeavors, such as the percussion of the Tetraktis quartet and the various instruments of the Novamusica Ensemble, centered on the sound of guitars and electric bass.

And then there are, united in a single project, the many voices of AdCantus Ensemble Vocale and Vocalia Consort prepared and directed by Francesco Corrias, who sing fragments of text that speak, precisely, of our unknown, of our dreaming, of our unknowing, of what we all, sooner or later, dare to wonder about.”

The texts, composed of short excerpts from a sacred book such as the Bible or Dante’s Commedia, from Shakespeare and Leopardi, to the twentieth century by Celine and Mario Luzi, are highly suggestive. “These are phrases from different times and cultures, but they express concepts that are still very close to us.

Fragments manipulated and reassembled, juxtaposed with much freedom and without historical or temporal logic. This technique, far from philological and chronological pretensions, has allowed me to use writings of all kinds with, at times, different valences and to propose the exploration of meanings that are revealed, with some novelty, in the relationship with the musical matter,” Ciammarughi explains.

The words and the music, or rather the thoughts of the music masterfully expressed, like a hidden, secret confession hidden among the notes. Because this is a record of throbbing and crossing over, of an imagination that wants to go beyond the predictable and the usual. Thirteen tracks that are a single body with which to celebrate freedom, an invitation to explore new sonic horizons, to be carried away by emotions. Ramberto Ciammarughi – Intramontes.