... The works collected here, written for different orchestral settings, with or without voice, offer a certainly not

exhaustive but solid and truthful image of the specificity of the figure of Matteo D'Amico on the contemporary

compositional horizon: the ability and will to weld thought to musical matter, gesture to form, sound to sense.

In his vast catalogue, it is always possible to find this trail, transmitted with firm persuasion and happy results.

Like an identifying mark, an author's scratch, an opening passage frequently recurs in his works that opens the

curtain, only to then perhaps stop, look around, listen to the voices of his fellow travellers, and resume the journey:

thus, immediately, in Le creature di Ade (The Creatures of Hades), a 'concert ouverture' composed in 2004

and dedicated to Daniele Gatti, who was it's first conductor. The title alludes to The Creatures of Prometheus,

Beethoven's work written for a choreography by Salvatore Viganò. The darkness of Hades, the opening up of it's

abysses, the terror induced in those who cross it, a sense of fearful waiting that allows a more encouraging

trace to filter through, the reemergence

of the anguished expectation: the exemplary journey of instrumental

theatre precedes the final twist, marked by a lively rhythmic charge, which in it's sudden conclusion leaves one

gasping for breath, while in the body of a classically structured orchestra the colours of the saxophone and the

pressing variety of the percussion set emerge...

Sandro Cappelletto