Giovanni Palombo - Retablo

“Retablo”, the latest album by the Italian fingerstylist Giovanni Palombo, certainly lives up to its name.

A retablo – retable in English – refers to a painting that often serves as a backdrop to altars. It is usually composed of different motives that are loosely connected to each other and form a visual unity. A retablo fuses artistic ornamentations, small relics and philosophical images. Apply that to Palombo's music, and you get a more than fitting image. With his own compositions, the Italian guitarist blends heartwarming and imaginative, timelessly beautiful instrumental music with a Mediterranean touch, improvisational, jazzy elements, as well as solos and duos. Palombo works with musically renowned guest performers, like Peter Finger, Claus Boesser-Ferrari, Luis Borda and Michael Manring to produce a collage of variegated and musical images, which he shapes into music with enduring quality.