Claudio Quartarone

Claudio Quartarone was born in Catania on September 8, 1984, where he spent his formative years. He demonstrated a natural inclination for music from early childhood, beginning his classical guitar studies at the age of eight under Maestro Domenico Spada. By the following year, he was already participating in his first guitar competitions, immediately winning widespread acclaim from the juries and securing numerous first prizes. Before even turning ten years old, he was already considered a child prodigy within the classical guitar community. Following his classical concert period, Claudio Quartarone dedicated himself to experimenting with electronic music and new forms of contemporary sonic language. Then, at nineteen, his music encountered Jazz, which would become his primary channel of expression. As a student of Maestro Claudio Cusmano, he drew attention within the Sicilian jazz scene before attending the Umbria Jazz Clinics in Perugia in 2006. In 2007, through the Siena Jazz Foundation, he won a scholarship to represent Italy at the I.A.S.J. (International Association of Schools of Jazz) international conference in Riga, Latvia, which led to the release of an album and DVD titled Jazz in Riga. On that occasion, he caught the attention of trumpeter Enrico Rava, who decided to include him on tour with his band, the Enrico Rava Special Edition.

Rava would later declare to the Corriere della Sera:

“A truly incredible guitarist, I think I have never heard anyone like him in Italy. His name is Quartarone, he comes from Catania—like Francesco Cafiso—that area is producing monstrously talented musicians.”

In 2011, he opened as a solo guitarist for the Paolo Fresu and Omar Sosa concert at the Metropolitan Theatre in Catania, Sicily. Than, the Comar23 label produced and distributed Subliminal, which was followed by numerous digital releases ranging from jazz to electronic crossovers and video art works—reflecting his constant search for new languages in the contemporary music world. In 2015, in his role as a composer, he scored the music for Think and Learn Big, an animated film inspired by the international bestseller Think and Grow Rich, produced and promoted by the American Napoleon Hill Foundation.

In the same year, a track from the album Calling Any Station was selected as the soundtrack for a commercial for the cosmetics brand VOR. He also provided the sound design and soundtracks for the popular French science communication channel ExperimentBoyTv. The American YouTube channel Second Thought, which also specializes in science communication, selected Quartarone’s compositions for many of its videos.

In January 2018, he published his first book, titled Metodo per chitarristi improvvisatori. Visione modale del sistema tonale (“Method for Improvising Guitarists: A Modal Vision of the Tonal System”), published by Workin’Label Produzioni. In May 2018, his new album, Changes, performed entirely as a solo guitar record, was also released and distributed under the Workin’Label label.

In March 2019, the new album Equilibrium was released across all digital stores. Later that year, he performed as a guest star at the OSS Festival alongside Yussef Dayes and Rocco Palladino.

In 2020, the Australian company Valiant Samples paid tribute to Claudio with Quartarone Guitar Reveries, a cinematic plug-in that captures every nuance of his touch and electric sound. Claudio Quartarone’s guitar uniqueness stems from the ever-present crossover between his formal training and experimentalism. His improvised music is built upon the classical technique inherent to the instrument—a combination that provides listeners with a sound and style immediately recognizable through his distinct touch.
Among those who chose to use the Quartarone Guitar Reveries digital instrument, Golden Globe-winning cinematic composer Burkhard Dallwitz—who won the award alongside Philip Glass for the soundtrack of The Truman Show—stands out.

In 2021, Claudio Quartarone composed and recorded the theme song for the podcast Cipro. Crocevia di Civiltà (“Cyprus: Crossroads of Civilizations”), produced by Scuola Holden and commissioned by the Royal Museums of Turin for the exhibition of the same name. That same year, the single You Are in Barbados was released under the British label DDE Records, featuring a collaboration with fellow Sicilian guitarist Matteo Mancuso.

In 2022, Oscar-winning producer Adam Leipzig, a great admirer of his compositions, invited him to collaborate on the soundtrack for the film Sicilian Holiday. In this project, in addition to contributing his original music, Claudio also played a prominent role as a musical performer within the film itself.

In the same year, he released Anamorfosi, a duo album with Umberto Fiorentino recorded for the Roman label Birdbox Records. In May of the following year, at the HIGH END 2023 event in Munich, II—the second album recorded with Fiorentino, also for Birdbox Records—was premiered. Late 2023 saw Claudio Quartarone collaborate first with one of the most prominent figures in Turkish music, Cenk Erdoğan, on the work titled Gebel for the Guitart label, and subsequently with Jordan Rudess, widely considered one of the greatest keyboardists of all time, on a co-written piece titled Still Woven.

In 2024, he released Mediterraneo, an album featuring compositions dedicated to his native land, Sicily.

Highlighting his international reach, his 2026 experience in Kenya saw him participate in a prestigious artistic residency. During his stay in Nairobi, Quartarone collaborated closely with trumpeter Mackinlay Mutsembi’s quartet and the renowned percussionist Kasiva Mutua. Parallel to his concert performances, he took on a significant academic role by conducting a series of masterclasses at the Nairobi Conservatory of Music.

Claudio Quartarone is the undisputed originator of a modern guitar paradigm. By translating classical finger mechanics directly onto both electric and acoustic frameworks within contemporary jazz improvisation, his early vision laid the foundational groundwork for a new generation of playing. While historical fingerstyle jazz remained strictly bound to acoustic traditions, Quartarone broke new ground by integrating this rigorous discipline into electric, ambient, and cross-genre territories. Today, through his extensive cross-cultural collaborations and boundary-pushing recordings, he stands not just as a virtuoso, but as the master source of a multi-layered, electrified orchestral language that continues to redefine the contemporary instrument.

Throughout his career, he has performed with some of the most prominent musicians on the national and international jazz scenes, including: Cenk Erdoğan, Francesco Cafiso, Enrico Rava, Jordan Rudess, Yussef Dayes, Rocco Palladino, Umberto Fiorentino, Gabriele Mirabassi, Daniele Tittarelli, Fabrizio Sferra, Giovanni Guidi, Mauro Ottolini, Stefano Senni, Dan Kinzelman, Andrea Beneventano, and Joao Lobo.