During the following years I had the occasion to visit many countries, both for work and for leisure. Each time, when I got in touch with a different culture with its own musical traditions, I have tried to find some very typical musical instruments. So, during my travels and over the years, I collected a lot of instruments: several of them are very ethnic and have their own story about how I found them and how I purchased them. You can read some fun notes following the songs and the links you will find in these pages. My general idea was to collect cheap and "odd" instruments, that I can maybe use in my productions to give a distinct sound and a particular colour. I also built a couple of instruments following some ideas I have in mind. But I also have a lot of other "standard" instruments purchased in Italy at flea markets and in shops. Some other ones are part of my life and of my "musical history".
I began to use these instruments in my songs and one day, in 2013, it came to my mind the idea to make some videos of myself playing my instruments, and to specifically compose songs to blend them together. I decided to put together sounds from cultures very distant from each other, both culturally and geographically. I decided not to follow any music-philological direction. I just played what it came to my mind in that particular moment, expressing my feelings and my musical ideas. I made very different songs, not confined to a specific genre.
Counting all my instruments, I realized that I have more than 80. I admit that in a single case, I asked a friend to lend me a specific instrument that I missed but that was absolutely needed to complete a song.
Eighty musical instruments from the whole world. And 13 songs that usually reflects memories of travels, ideas of distant lands, foreign cultures and traditional sounds, and depicts original atmospheres and soundscapes.
I finally decided to board on a musical journey around the world. Following the steps of Willy Fog in the novel of Jules Verne, I named my project "Around the World in Eighty Instruments": follow me and enjoy this musical trip!
Be sure to click on the song title to get additional informations on the songs and on the instrments used.
You can also have a look at the instruments list and listen to each instrument I have used.
Some technical notes regarding the recording process.
Download the whole album on bandcamp, listen and share it through Soundcloud and have a look at the video on my Youtube channel
Around the world in eighty instruments by Matteo Bosi is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available by writing an email to the author.