Raffaele La Ragione, Il Pomo d'Oro & Francesco Corti
Biography Raffaele La Ragione, Il Pomo d'Oro & Francesco Corti
Raffaele La Ragione
Born in Naples in 1986, Raffaele La Ragione took up the mandolin at a very early age. Pursuing his longstanding interest in musicological research and the original repertoire for the instrument, he earned a degree in Drama, Art and Music Studies in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities at the University of Bologna, with a thesis on the instrument building and musical tradition of the Neapolitan Calace family. He subsequently earned a degree in mandolin at the Milan Conservatory with Ugo Orlandi.
Raffaele regularly performs with various orchestral and chamber ensembles, and has given concerts throughout Italy and Europe (Germany, Austria, France, Spain, Greece, Croatia, Poland, Switzerland, Slovakia, Hungary, Sweden, Turkey), as well as in Asia (China, Japan, South Korea). Ensembles include, among others, the Greek National Opera, the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra (Myung-Whun Chung), the OSI Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana, Silete Venti!, and I Solisti Veneti (Claudio Scimone).
Since 2009, he has performed regularly with the pianist Giacomo Ferrari, in both concerts and recordings dedicated to the original repertoire for mandolin and piano: Serenata Napoletana (Brilliant Classics 2015), and Margola Music for mandolin and other chamber music (Brilliant Classics 2019). In 2015 he founded the Motus Mandolin Quartet with whom he recorded the album Raffaele Calace Music for Mandolin Quartet (Brilliant Classics 2017). Together with Ugo Orlandi, following years of research, he recorded the album Nicola Calace Je Reviendrai (2014), dedicated to the figure of Nicola Calace, Raffaele’s brother. With him he also oversaw the publication of the book Carlo Munier il poeta del mandolino (2011).
On the occasion of the 250th anniversary of the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven, he recorded the CD Beethoven and his contemporaries with the fortepianist Marco Crosetto (Arcana 2020).
Since 2018 he has been a member of the Orchestra Italiana of Renzo Arbore, with whom he has toured Italy and appeared in television broadcasts on Rai1, Rai2 and Rai5.
Francesco Corti
(Arezzo, 1984) studied organ and harpsichord in Perugia, Geneva and Amsterdam. Prized at the Bach- Wettbewerb Leipzig (2006) and at the Bruges Harpsichord Competition (2007). Member of Les Musiciens du Louvre, Ensemble Zefiro, Bach Collegium Japan, Harmonie Universelle, Les Talens Lyriques. Regularly conducts Les Musiciens du Louvre, invited as guest conductor by B’Rock, Holland Baroque Society and De Nederlandse Bach Vereniging.
Since 2018 he is principal guest conductor of Il Pomo d’Oro. Performs as soloist all over Europre, USA, Latin America, Far East.
His solo recordings including L. Couperin’s Suites, Bach’s partitas and concertos, Haydn sonatas, Mozart’s piano quartets. Since 2016, professor of harpsichord and thorough bass at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis.
