Enrico Zanisi
Piano
He graduated with honors in piano at the age of 18 from the Conservatory of L’Aquila under Maestro Valter Fischetti, and obtained a second-level degree with honors in jazz from the Conservatory of Frosinone. As a classical pianist, he has won numerous national and international piano and chamber music competitions.
At the age of 15, he became interested in jazz, studying with Marco Di Gennaro and attending summer courses at “Siena Jazz 2005,” “Roma Jazz’s Cool 2006–2008–2009,” and “Umbria Jazz 2008,” where he followed lessons by S. Battaglia, K. Werner, M. Stamm, J. Calderazzo, P. Markowitz, and L. Grenadier.
As a jazz pianist, he won first prize and a scholarship at the “Franco Russo National Competition for Jazz Piano Composition and Performance” (Trieste, 2007); he placed second at the “Roma Jam Session 2007” competition; he received First Prize and the Audience Prize at the national competition for new talents in Italian jazz “Chicco Bettinardi” (Piacenza, 2009); and won the third edition of the “Vittoria Rotary Jazz Award,” established by saxophonist Francesco Cafiso (Vittoria, 2010).
In 2008 he won a $10,000 scholarship to attend a one-year program at Berklee College of Music in Boston, and in 2009 he passed the audition for admission to the jazz department of the Manhattan School of Music in New York. In 2009 he recorded Quasi Troppo Serio with Pietro Ciancaglini and Ettore Fioravanti, produced by Nuccia and distributed by Egea.
In 2011 he formed a new trio under his own name with Alessandro Paternesi on drums and Joe Rehmer, with whom he recorded two albums released by Cam Jazz: Life Variations (October 2012) and Keywords (January 2014). In 2015 he released Right Now for Cam Jazz, a duo recording with saxophonist Mattia Cigalini.
In 2012 he won the Top Jazz award as Best Young Talent, awarded by the magazine Musica Jazz. In 2013 the “Vita Vita” festival in Civitanova Marche awarded him as an outstanding young Italian talent. In 2014 he received the SIAE Prize for Creativity.
He has performed with Sheila Jordan, David Liebman, Andy Sheppard, Sarah Jane Morris, Stefano Di Battista, Javier Girotto, Dedè Ceccarelli, Giovanni Tommaso, Francesco Cafiso, Ares Tavolazzi, Ada Montellanico, Fabrizio Bosso, Maria Pia De Vito, Fabrizio Sferra, Roberto Gatto, Paolo Fresu, Anthony Pinciotti, Roberta Gambarini, Enzo Favata, Enzo Pietropaoli, Dario Deidda, Gabriele Mirabassi, Rosario Bonaccorso, Flavio Boltro, among others.
He has appeared at major Italian festivals including Villa Celimontana Jazz Festival, Umbria Jazz Winter and Umbria Jazz, Casa del Jazz, Auditorium Parco della Musica, European Jazz Expo, Piacenza Jazz Festival, Bergamo Jazz Festival, Trieste Loves Jazz, Garda Jazz Festival, Vicenza Jazz, Crossroads, Festival Mundus, MITO Festival, Roccella Jonica Jazz Festival, and Ischia Jazz.
Abroad he has performed at the 12 Points Festival in Dublin, Tabarka Jazz Festival in Tunisia, Tanjazz in Tangier, Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival, Warsaw Jamboree Jazz Festival, in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, the “Musica 2014” Festival in Harare (Zimbabwe), New Delhi International Jazz Festival, Blue Frog in Mumbai, Ahmedabad, the Heineken Jazz Festival in Puerto Rico, in Brazil, Mexico, and at Italian Cultural Institutes in Strasbourg and London.
