There are publications that take you in immediately and don’t let you go. The album Materia by Italian artist Simone Giudice, released in winter 2021 on Semantica, is such a work. Captivating in its diversity and brilliantly led arrangements, it left me speechless. Therefore, I wanted to know who is behind this music.
J: I was amazed when Svreca sent me your album Materia. It shows the wonderful versatility of your music. How did the connection with Semantica come about? Can you tell us more about the circumstances under which your album came about? Was there a concept that guided you in producing the album?
S: Thank you so much for inviting me to this conversation with you, I am very happy. The bond with Semantica was a total surprise to me. One day I received a message from Enrique (Svreca) asking me if I was pleased to release some music for Semantica, because he really appreciated my album released for Delirio Rec La Label by Giuseppe Dileria. At that moment I was incredulous, actually I also felt a little fear but at the same time I had an incredible adrenaline. Semantica is and has always been a Label reference for the scene that I always appreciated greatly. So I accepted and I went to work the same day. The creative process of Materia was very fast because I already knew the path to take and also Enrique left me maximum freedom and confidence. My music is mainly born on the basis of feelings. Most of my choices are made on the basis of emotions. If I have something to tell I do it through music. Art is a particularly important thing to me because it is one of the ways in which I understand and describe my world.
J: What does your daily studio life look like, what kind of hardware or software plays a crucial role in your production process? Is there an approach that you would characterise as typical for you? Are there any plans to perform your album live??
S: The relationship with my studio is of love and hate, there are some periods in which my monitors stay off for a long time and others that stay on for days. All due to my sinusoidal mood. Regarding my instrumentation, I don’t feel like making a list of what I use and what I think about it but rather what I want to get from that instrument. Everything starts from an idea, this is the fundamental thing, then subsequently I choose the analog or digital instruments that can translate that idea. I don’t put limits, space from the field recording to the vst to the programming language to the analog machine. The last purchase is a novation peak and I am having a lot of fun. Soon I am going to perform live for a festival, I think that soon it will be announced.
J: You studied at the “Santa Cecilia” Music Conservatory in Rome. In what way did this change your approach to composing music?m your album live??
S: My path is born from the clubs as DJ but it wasn’t enough, I decided I wanted to understand more because I had too many questions without answers. I started studying and I enrolled in a sound engineer course in an important studio in Bologna, the Fonoprint. It was a very technical course, based on mixing and mastering but I didn’t feel satisfied. I wanted to learn how to translate what I had inside into music so I decided to move to Rome and enroll in electroacoustic composition at the Santa Cecilia conservatory. The conservatory is an enlightening experience. It completely opened my mind, and gave to me a new vision not only technical but also conceptual. I had excellent teachers in the conservatory, but I also met some outside the Academy, one above all my friend Giuseppe Tillieci aka Neel.
J: Where do you get the inspiration for your music, does it come more from your emotional inner life or is it more visual impressions resulting from activities in nature or similar? Are there any artists or labels that have had a lasting musical influence on you?
S: Inspiration can come from many things because we are like sponges. We receive indirect and direct “information” everyday. The artist is then the one who gives shape to that content. I reflect a lot on the stimuli that come to me trying to maintain my identity by translating them into sounds, because in my opinion it is the most important thing. I don’t make music to emerge but to distinguish myself in telling my vision. Music is a powerful weapon. I have many influences, ranging in different arts, places and people, I appreciate many contemporary and non-contemporary artists but the list would be long..
Joachim Spieth 