Andrea Oliva

“Andrea Oliva is one of the best flutists of his generation, a shining star in the world of the flute”. This is what Sir James Galway said about Andrea Oliva, Principal Flutist at Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia Orchestra in Rome since 2003.   Andrea Oliva was born in Modena in 1977. In just five years, he graduated with full marks from the Istituto Musicale “Vecchi-Tonelli” of Modena with G. Betti as his tutor. He then specialized with C. Montafia, G. Cambursano, J. C. Gérard and Sir J. Galway. His career has been a brilliant one since the very beginning. Among the many awards he has received in the most important international competitions, particularly relevant are his first prize at the International Competition in Kobe (2005, the first Italian flutist ever to achieve this prize) and his third prize at ARD International Competition in Munich (2004).   As a soloist, he has performed in some of the most important halls in the world: Carnegie Hall in New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art in London in the presence of Queen Elizabeth, the prestigious Bunka Kaikan Hall in Tokyo, the Hong Kong Academy, and also in Chile and Cuba. He was a permanent member of the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra, and he attended the Herbert von Karajan Academy.   At the age of 23, he was invited by the Berliner Philharmoniker to perform as Principal Flutist under prestigious conductors such as C. Abbado, L. Maazel, V. Gerghiev, S. Oramo, M. Jansons and B. Haitink. Personally invited by Claudio Abbado, he has performed with Bologna Mozart Orchestra, at the academy of which he regularly teaches.   From 2001 to 2003 he performed as principal flutist with the Orchestra del Teatro dell’Opera in Rome and, in this role, he presently collaborates with numerous orchestras such as the Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala in Milan, the Bayerische Rundfunk, the Chamber Orchestra of Munich, the Bamberger Symphoniker, the ORT in Florence and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.   He has performed several times as a soloist with the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome conducted by C. Hogwood, M. W. Chung and, in March 2010, by A. Pappano. On this occasion he played C. Nielsen’s Concert, which was broadcast by the Italian National television channel RAI 3. He regularly collaborates with outstanding artists such as A. Lonquich, E. Pace, N. Carusi, A. Hewitt, I. Fliter, and Sir J. Galway.   He is a member of both GlobeDuo (http://www.globeduo.com) and Kaleido Ensemble (http://www.kaleidoensemble), with which he has performed not only during the most important Italian musical seasons, but also in the U.S.A., Latin America, Europe and Asia. He has a very high reputation as a teacher. He holds specializing classes in Rome at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, and he also teaches at the Istituto Musicale “Vecchi – Tonelli” in Modena for postgraduate courses. Since 2011 he has been teaching at the Accademia Internazionale di Flauto in Imola within the programme “Incontri col Maestro”.   He also holds master classes all over the world. For ARTS, he has recorded Beethoven’s Duet with flutist M. Marasco; for FaLaUt Edition, Prokofiev, Poulenc and Martin’s Sonatas for flute and piano and, for Le Chant de Linos, Händel’s Sonatas. In June 2009, for Amadeus Magazine, he recorded Olivier Messiaen’s Le Merle Noir for flute and piano, with A. Pepicelli as pianist. In 2011 he recorded the CD “Globe” with the guitarist Costanza Savarese (GlobeDuo for Wide Classique). Soon to be published are a didactic DVD dealing with flute for the collection “Soffia la Musica” (Accademia Publishers) and the CD Bach Flute Sonatas, recorded with the Canadian pianist Angela Hewitt for Hyperion.