Minimal Instrumental from Leonardo Barilaro

Italian Pianist and aerospace engineer Leonardo Barilaro dreams of playing the first piano concert on Mars. With his unique brand of atmospheric piano and minimal electronic compositions, his music reflects the vast expanse and sense of unknown that his interstellar aspirations represent.

Since the start of the pandemic the prolific composer and performer, now based in Malta, has produced and released an impressive five EPs and twelve singles, developing his contemporary space music genre. Over that time he’s released a tribute to Anathema, in collaboration with metal queen Mariangela Demurtas (lead singer of Tristania), and a jazztronica composition with legendary drummer Marco Minnemann.

With his latest EP, he brings us the highly experimental work Plana Cauda, an exploration of ethereal and dissonant sonic soundscapes. The EP is a journey through dark meditative space, channelling the sad glimmering that is inside everyone, though its eerie space-futuristic sound.

Pairing his contrasting background as an accomplished composer and an aerospace engineer, the title of the EP was created by hybridising words with a poetic licence from Latin language to describe the grand piano and from Portuguese to refer to the vertical stabiliser in the tail section an aircraft, used to manoeuvre in the air.

Alluding to the complex and challenging nature of his work, he comments, “This music is not for everyone, since it requires patience in the listening, due also to contemporary techniques used, such as percussion of the strings using the hands, and requires accepting to go out for a while from the boxes defined by social media, where only good smiles and happy appearances are usually shared online.”

Listen to Plano Cauda below