About Us
Laborintus Harp Quartet
The Laborintus Harp Quartet is the natural evolution of the Adria Harp Quartet, commissioned by the first harpist Cristiana Passerini, who presented it in 2022 at the "Musica Maestri" review of the Verdi Conservatory in Milan, receiving great public approval. There are essentially two directions for the group: to sensitize the composers of our time to create new works that highlight the peculiarities of this ensemble and enrich their repertoire with contaminations also towards new technologies and sophisticated electronics and to perform the music of J.S. Bach, thus distancing himself from the worlds of popular transcription. Precisely for this transversal address, various international festivals have already engaged the Laborintus Harp Quartet for next year. The harp quartet was born in 2012 as an educational project on ensemble music within the Adria Conservatory of Music, where Cristiana Passerini taught and soon freed itself from its formative origins by embarking on the specific path of commissioning and performing music of our time . In 2018 Tactus released "Musica per quartetto d'arpe" with booklet by Giordano Montecchi. Among the performances, we mention the Forfest in Kromeriz in the Czech Republic entirely with works in world premiere, International Plucked String of Timisoara, Cage on the Water Project at the Teatro Comunale in Bologna, Verona Risuona, Active Music for the Ghirardi Foundation at Villa Contarini of Piazzola sul Brenta of Padua, Maskfest Italy and San Marino.
There is no instrument so strongly evocative of inscrutable prehistory, remote civilizations, ancestral mythologies as the harp. Put so apodictically, it is an absolutely questionable assertion.
But it is precisely this questionability that contains the fertile material, from which springs the impulse to investigate the possible meaning incorporated in this handful of
new compositions for harp, indeed for harp quartet, which further qualifies this recording enterprise:
seven original compositions, specially commissioned and premiered.
The new music is performed by the Adria Harp Quartet, an ensemble born and raised precisely with the specific peculiarity of studying the interpretation of new compositions in the contemporary Italian stage, with the clear intention of researching with all the means made available by the new languages
(supports electronic and interactive instruments alongside the most recent executive techniques
devised for the harp), still unexplored paths,
making use of the distinctive timbre characteristics of this fascinating instrument.
Cristiana Passerini
Cristiana Passerini, from Bologna, graduated at the age of eighteen with honors under the guidance of A.N. Schirinzi, then perfecting himself with J. Liber. Alongside the traditional profession of solo harpist, he has collaborated with the chamber groups Nextime, A. Toscanini, FontanaMix, Virtuosi Italiani, Icarus, Octandre in recordings for Dynamic, Arkadia, Chandos, Tactus and numerous first performances of authors of our time. For several years she collaborated as first harp with the Rai of Naples, the Toscanini Foundation and the RTSI of Lugano; occasionally with the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, the Foi Bruno Bartoletti, the Arena, La Fenice, the Regio di Torino, playing with conductors such as Muti, Inbal, Nagano, Metha, Maazel, Latham-König. He edited for Ut Orpheus a nineteenth-century Urtext and transcribed for solo harp works by Debussy and Bach for Rugginenti-Volonté including the Suite BWV 997, a novelty in the harp repertoire, which was selected in 2009 as a compulsory test at the 50th edition of the International Harp Contest in Israel. At the G. Verdi Conservatory in Milan, where he has held the harp chair since 2017, he also teaches ancient practice, contemporary music and musical philology as a discipline included in the instrument literature courses. Teaching in the Conservatory, recordings, concerts, publications, seminars, masterclasses, radio interviews: the varied activity aimed at testifying and promoting the importance of studying the music of J.S. Bach - historically excluded for the harp - which, together with the indispensable historical-stylistic knowledge, make the student more aware in identifying the evolutions of writing and practices. In this regard, the engravings for La Bottega Discantica in Milan are mentioned: the recently released box set J.S. Bach, The French Suites BWV 812-817 with illustrative notes by M. Moiraghi which obtained the maximum score in Musica magazine and the single J.S. Bach Suites BWV 996, 997, 1006a of 2009 with notes by M. Baroni; for the same label a monograph on G.F. Händel, with notes by B. Zanolini.
Francesca Miglierina
She was born in Varese and at the age of eight she approached music and the study of the harp with the Suzuki method. At the G. Verdi Conservatory in Milan she obtained the Diploma in harp in 2012. She continued his studies in Germany at the "Robert Schumann Hochschule" in Düsseldorf, where she obtained a Master of Music with an orchestral focus in 2016 and a Master of Music with a solo focus in 2018 under the guidance of Fabiana Trani. In July 2022, again at the Verdi in Milan, she obtained the II level Master in Harp under the guidance of Cristiana Passerini and Maria Elena Bovio.
Francesca collaborates with various orchestras, won the audition as first harp at the Osnabrück Theater in Germany, was eligible at the Petruzzelli Theater in Bari, the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in Florence, the Verdi Theater in Trieste, the Haydn Foundation in Bolzano and Trento, the Sicilian Symphony Orchestra of Palermo.
Since 2023 she has been a harp teacher at the Antonio Buzzolla Conservatory in Adria.
Angelica Ferrari
She brilliantly graduated in harp at the “A. Buzzolla” in Adria under the guidance of Cristiana Passerini. He continued his studies at the Faculty of Psychology at the University of Padua and subsequently obtained a II level degree in Music Therapy with honors at the Conservatorio “G. Frescobaldi” of Ferrara. She was awarded second prize at the international competitions “Città di Treviso”, “A. Salieri” in Legnago and in the national competition "Città di Piove di Sacco". He plays with the Blumine ensemble of Bologna and collaborates with the Padua and Veneto Orchestra, the Silver Symphony Orchestra of Padua, the Padua Civic Wind Orchestra and the Ferrara City Orchestra. As far as teaching is concerned, she taught harp at the “G. Verdi” in Venice, the “G. Frescobaldi” in Ferrara within the “Giovanissimi” project, in Albignasego (PD) within the “Prokofiev” project, at the Istituto Musicale G.F. Malipiero CAMP in Padua, at the Liceo Musicale “C. Marchesi” in Padua and at the “G. Verdi” in Conselve (PD).
Leonardo Ciacci
Leonardo Ciacci was born in Milan in 2001, where he began studying the harp by attending the school "Il Classico Associazione di Musica e d'Arte" with the teacher Chiara Granata from 2008 to 2019. In 2015 he participated in the V Edition of the Competition National Music Civic School of Music Claudio Abbado, Soloists Category, obtaining the score of 99/100. In 2017 he participated in the 7th International Harp Contest "Suoni d'Arpa" in Saluzzo, obtaining the Diploma of Merit for the best interpretation of the obligatory piece. In 2020 he obtained the classical high school diploma at the I.S. Salvador Allende, with a score of 95/100. Since 2020 she has been attending the first level degree course in Harp at the “G. Verdi” in Milan and at the same time the Faculty of Letters at the State University of Milan. At the Milan Conservatory he attended the Seminars held by the Masters L. Rossi, P. Cherici, L. Bertani and a masterclass with F. Pierre.