Francesco Paolo Barbaria graduated with top marks, from the early years of his studies he was able to display a high level of musicality: when he was still in his second year of studies he recorded live Glazunov’s concerto for saxophone and orchestra.
Throughout the years, Francesco Barbaria participated in a number of concerts both as a soloist and as a member of a quartet. Such concerts were organized by high-profile local organizations like “Amici dellaMusica” of Palermo, “Amici dellaMusica G. Mule” of Termini Imerese (Pa) and “DimoreStoricheItaliane” amongst others. Ha also participated in events organized for humanitarian causes like Telethon, the Talassemia project and Unicef.
In 2002, he collaborated with composer Claudio Scannavini in a festival for contemporary music that was supported by the Conservatorio V. Bellini.
As a member of a saxophone quartet he won the first price in the “VIII Concorso Nazionale per giovani musicisti” in Caccamo (Pa) and in the “VII Concorso Internazionale Città di Palermo”. He was also classified amongst the top places in the first European musical competition Musicatri, in Atri (Te) and at the “Concorso Internazionale Premio Seiler” in Palermo. As a soloist he won first prize at the “XV ConcorsoNazionale per giovani musicisti” in Caccamo (Pa), the “XVI Concorso Nazionale per giovani solisti” in Palermo, the 16th edition of the “NuoviOrizzonti” Competition at Arezzo, the 28th edition of A.M.A. CALABRIA in LameziaTerme, the 14th edition of the “Concorso Internazionale Nuovi Orizzonti” in Padova and was also overall winner of the 6th competition “Città di Bagheria” and the 16th edition of the international competition “Premio Crescendo” in Firenze.
He studied with Fabrizio Mancuso (renowned saxophonist from the Habanera Quartet), Mario Ciaccio, Geraud Etrillard and Antonino Peri. He has also attended masterclasses with various world-renowned saxophonists including Claude Delangle, Fabrice Moretti, Ernie Watts, Herrero Sixto, Antonino Mollica, Simon Diricq, Sergey Kolesov, Vincent David, Gilles Tressos, Jean-Marie Londeix, Christian Wirth, Jean-Yves Fourmeau, Jérôme Laran, Pascal Bonnet, Arno Bornkamp, Lars Mlekusch and Jean-Yves Chevalier.
In 2015 he participated, for the first time, at the XVII World Saxophone Congress in Strasbourg, representing Italy with two ensembles of the Italian saxophonist and, in 2018, he repeats the participation in the XVIII World Congress of the Saxophone, held in Zagreb, participating, this time, as a soloist playing music by Stefano Gervasoni and Giuseppe Mazzamuto.
He has also furthered his musical studies with emphasis on the saxophone at the “Conservatorio A. Scontrino” of Trapani, graduating with maximum points. Lately, he has formed a duo Les Deux Duos with which he is furthering his career. He is also collaborating with “Teatro Massimo V. Bellini“in Catania and the “Fondazione Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana” of Palermo where, in 2017, he performed the rhapsody by André Waignein for alto sax soloist and orchestra, the only performance in Italy.
In 2018 he founded the chamber duo Zeugma Duo with pianist Michele Allegro performing music by Schubert, Brahms, Kreisler, Williams, Cockcroft and Piazzolla.
He is a jury member in a lot of music competition and a teacher in the secondary schools of saxophone of Alcamo (Tp) and Trapani.
