Guitarist Francesco Lo Castro returns to the EFG London Jazz Festival with an evening of original music based on improvisation mixed with Italian melodic tradition, funk, soul and drum&bass.  

Born in the south of Italy, Francesco started studying guitar and jazz aged 25 developing his style and technique under the tutoring of the italian maestro Gianni Cataleta.

In 2004, having decided to quit his day job and economic studies, He moved to London to fully focus on music and two years later he graduated in Music Performance while in the same year he won both the Best Guitarist Award at the Guitar Institute in London and the Vice Chancellor Award at TVU. His guitar style suggests an intriguing and smooth combination of melodic Italian tradition and visual sound-scapes fused with jazz harmony.

Having recorded and toured both in Europe and in the US He has released ten Albums to date including works with Grammy Award winner Eric DeFade and with the Improfives collective. For this concert He teams up with Claudio Corona (Keys) and Cosimo Keita (Drums) and together they will explore Francesco’s original compositions drawn from his catalogue plus unreleased material.

“I am very excited to be playing at the Oliver’s for the EFG London Jazz Festival” says Francesco “and in particular to be improvising and creating music in the company of two great musicians and friends.”

Francesco Lo Castro: Guitar
Claudio Corona: Keyboards
Cosimo Keita: Drums