Louis Siciliano

(from Womex website)

Louis Siciliano is one of the most creative and brilliant synth performer, composer and producer of our time.
His music production as recording artist encompasses styles including modern jazz, electronic music, progressive, world, contemporary and film-music.
He  was introduced to the music of American jazz greats from an early age. At 7 years old, he started his musical education at a conservatory, studying composition, orchestra conducting, piano, organ, classical guitar, choir conducting, electronic music, and computer music. He quickly became a collaborator and assistant to Antonio De Santis, a pioneer of electronic music and co-founder of IRCAM in Paris. At 16, he made his debut as a professional orchestra conductor in Naples, the city where he was born.
In the 1990s, Louis Siciliano moved to the Netherlands where he completed his studies at the Groningen Conservatory. He then honed his skills at the Paris Conservatoire Supérieur de Musique with Gerard Grisey, at the IRCAM in Paris, and at New York University where he earned a Master’s in Music Technology with Robert Rowe. He also graduated with honors from the Recording Academy in San Francisco, studying under the Beatles’ sound engineer, Peter Miller.
Louis further studied Jazz harmony and arrangement at the Berklee College of Music in Boston with Larry Monroe and quickly advanced his training through his interactions with guitarists Mick Goodrick and Joe Diorio.
During his time in New York in the 1990s, Louis worked as a performer in various groups and bands ranging from Jazz (Frankie Dee and his Big Band, a historic collaborator of Duke Ellington) to Latin music and avant-garde. With the help of Tony Ferro, Paul Anka’s manager, he began working as an arranger, music programmer, and sound designer at Studio 78/88 in Queens, a hub of the New York hip hop scene. He formed relationships with artists such as Run DMC, Tupac, Masta Ace, Group Home, and figures such as Diana Ross.
A few years later, Louis Siciliano landed a job at Englewood Studios with producer Dae Bennett. Here, he encountered legends like Michael Jackson and Tony Bennett and became part of the Italian Legacy of Music Producers along with Phil Ramone, Tony Maserati, and Tony Mottola. He rubbed shoulders with notable figures such as Chuck Ainlay (producer of Dire Straits), sound engineer Bruce Swedien (Michael Jackson, Santana), and Neil Dorfsman (producer of Bruce Springsteen), who later selected him as a Grammy Awards jury member.
During this productive time, Louis Siciliano met Alan Parsons and figures like Akira Fukada, director of NHK Recording Studios in Tokyo, and began producing and mixing music in 5.1 Surround sound. He was even named Protools Surround Guru by Digidesign in the early 2000s.
Attending New York University allowed Louis to meet numerous independent directors and start his career as a film score composer. This led him to work with several Italian film directors, including Salvatores, Oldoini, Colella, Cattani, Aronadio, and Assisi, on over 35 films. He won various awards, including the Nastro D’Argento (the Italian Oscar) and twice the award for Best Film Music Composer from the Italian Federation of Essay Cinemas at the Venice Film Festival in 2010.
During one of his stops in Los Angeles, where he lives right now, Louis Siciliano met Wayne Shorter, with whom he experimented with the revolutionary musical language MUMEX (Music Multiverse Exploration – A New Cosmology of Sound).
Thanks to this knowledge, Louis Siciliano came into contact with the world of American jazz.
For years now, Louis Siciliano has been dividing his time between the United States, UK, Italy, Poland, and India. It was in India that Louis became part of the Banaras Gharana, the caste of musicians from Varanasi on the Ganges, through his study of the Shehnai in the mid-1990s with Ustad Ali Abbas Khan, nephew of the legendary Ustad Bismillah Khan, the Sarangi with Pandit Kanhaiyalal Mishra, and the ancient Dhrupad singing with Ustad Hussain Sayeeduddin Dagar.
Louis Siciliano has a deep friendship with Wayne Shorter that has greatly influenced his life and music. In 2022, he received 4 INDIESHARK Awards as a representative of the new sound of Global Jazz in the United States. That same year, with the help of critic and musicologist Renzo Cresti, Louis recorded his new album, ANCIENT COSMIC TRUTH – A Suite in 4 Movements (Musica Presente Records).
 He won in March 2023 for his latest album ANCIENT COSMIC TRUTH the INDIESHARK’s AWARD Pick of the week.
ANCIENT COSMIC TRUTH by Louis Siciliano feat. Alex Acuña (Weather Report), Randy Brecker(Brecker Brothers), Umberto Muselli & Claudio Romano running in the BEST ALTERNATIVE JAZZ ALBUM category at the Grammy Awards 2024.