Raphael Gualazzi is an Italian Platinum selling jazz, soul, swing, and pop artist known internationally for his unique style of playing piano which merges influences from classical music, stride piano and ragtime. A multi-faceted musician, Raphael is a singer, songwriter, pianist, musician, composer, band leader, arranger, and producer.
Raphael’s career began with fast-rising popularity in the jazz scene in Italy and France, and in 2011, he won Italy’s prestigious national song contest Sanremo for his song Follia d’Amore: a fusion of and homage to Italian melodic and American swing. That year he won the Mia Martini Critics Award, the Radio and TV press room Award, and the Assomusica Award for best live performance. He then went on to claim second place at the Eurovision Song Contest and toured extensively throughout Europe. He returned to Sanremo’s Ariston Stage three more times with immense public and critical success, in 2014 winning second place for Libero o No in collaboration with The Bloody Beetroots for their original project that fused jazz, electronic, blues, and gospel music.
Raphael has collaborated on stage and in the studio with international artists like Melody Gardot, Andrea Boccelli, Gregory Porter, Tommy Lee, Gilles Peterson, Suzanne Vega, Pedrito Martinez, Camille, Stefano Bollani, Metropole Orkest, WDR Big Band, The Bloody Beetroots, Mario Biondi, Puppini Sisters, Renaud Letang, Simona Molinari, China Moses, Paolo Fresu, Fabrizio Bosso, Vince Medoza, Margherita Vicario, Edoardo Zosi, Andrea Obiso, Danilo Rossi and many others.
Raphael has performed on some of the world’s most prestigious stages, including Saint Germain Jazz in Paris, Il Teatro alla Scala di Milano, Nancy Jazz Pulsations, Jazz In Marciac, Madrid’s Dìa della Musica, Jazz a Carthage Tunisia, the Italian Innovation Day in Brussels, Montreal en Lumiere and many others. He has also toured in Japan, Indonesia, USA, Canada, UK, South Africa, and Argentina and has performed live on numerous television and radio networks throughout Europe.
Raphael has released seven studio albums and three EPs with Sugar Music and has two platinum records and three gold records for his studio albums Reality and Fantasy, Happy Mistake and Love Life Peace. Due to his popularity in Japan, a Best of Album was released in 2018 which was presented with a sold-out performance at Blue Note, Tokyo.
His work as a songwriter includes Vertigo which was featured in Andrea Boccelli’s Grammy nominated album, Si and he wrote the Giro D’Italia’s 2024 anthem Il Giro. His music has appeared in international commercials (Adobe, Lipton, Telecom, Fiat, Costa, ENI) and he has scored music for several film soundtracks including Un Ragazzo D’oro (Pupi Avati), Manuale D’Amore (Giovanni Veronesi) e Netflix Series Summertime Mi Pequeño Chet Baker (Mauro Diez). He performed on the Jazz loves Disney album (Blue Note Records), recording in New York and duetting with Melody Gardot.
In 2017 Raphael arranged and directed the esteemed and hugely popular traditional musical festival La Notte della Taranta, which celebrates the musical traditions of the historic Salento region, performing in front of an audience of 200,000 people, broadcast live on national television.
Since studying at the Classical Conservotory Gioachino Rossini, Raphael has always experimented with a wide range of musical styles. As a musician and songwriter, Raphael merges diverse musical genres, creating a uniquely personal style which combines his passion for both modern and classical and fuses Italian melodic traditions with his love for African-American music, simultaneously celebrating and transcending all genres.
Raphael’s latest album project, Dreams, released by CAM Sugar, presents a hybrid of musical styles, from classical music to Afro-funk, new soul, and jazz. His use of analogue synthesizers and vintage keyboards in some of these compositions alludes to the Italian 70s’ and 80’s electronic scene he was born into, while his choice of tribal percussions, soulful vocals, orchestrated ballads, and acoustic love songs really demonstrate the vast and eclectic breadth of Raphael’s love for experimentation and pushing musical expression beyond genre borders.
