PAOLO MARTANO

Still a child, he studied classic guitar for 10 years before discovering ‘bossa nova’, and dedicating to brazilian music and jazz, with some musical experiences in Italyand abroad. From 1986 to 1992 he lived for some years in Latin America, 3 years based in Ecuador and 3 years in Brazil, were he also studied popular percussion and jazz improvisation applied to Brazilian popular music in CIGAM music school in Rio. In 1987 he discovered salsa music during holidays in Cali (Colombia), falling in love for it and this dance and travelling to Cuba and Venezuela investigating music and dance styles .

In 1989 he started studying Brazilian dance (samba de gafieira, bolero, lambada) in Rio. Amomg his teachers: Jaime Aroxa, Joao Carlos Ramos (Cia Aerea de Dança), and finally he discovered Jimmy de Oliveira, when he was still almost unknown as professor, and accompanied the evolution of his samba style since 1992 to now, from traditional to ‘funkeado’.

Jimmy was invited by Paolo in Italy (Lecce), in his first trip out of Brazil for shows and workshops in 1999, when samba de gafieira was still unknown in Europe. Unfortunately at that time samba was considered ‘too difficult’ to become popular such as salsa, that had started in Lecce in 1993 due to Paolo’s teaching.

He studied also Tango since 1997, starting with Paulo Araujo and Marcio Carreiro em Rio, and then in Rome with Mauro Barreras, Javier and Geraldine , Anna Mantinan, Gustavo Saens and many others. However Tango got a fundamental place in his dance after the original teaching by Norberto ‘El Pulpo’ Esbrez, and the discovering of the so called ‘Nuevo’ style in lots of lessons and workshops with Gustavo Naveira, Fabian Salas and finally Mariano ‘Chicho’ Frumboli, whose style and techniques became a fundamental in Paolo’s dance, together with many other inputs from the tango ‘new generation’ that he frequented in Buenos Aires in 10 years travels from 2001 to 2012. (Pablo Inza, Mario Consiglieri, Gaston Torelli, Raul Masciocchi, Pablo Villaraza e Dana Frigoli and many others..)

In 1998, looking for something to quickly improve flexibility during teaching to his dancing partners he went back to his old knowledge of ‘lambada’, that in the meantime had become ‘lambazouk’ and started a new period of lessons first with Adilio Porto, Renata Peçanha in Rio, following with Romina Hidalgo (B. Aires), Gilson Damasco, Rodrigo Delano, and then turning to the new movements of Neozouk and Zouk-flow in Rio, and follwing for some years the teaching of Mafie Zouker, and also Bruno ‘Arkkanjo’, that use contact concepts to emphasize connection.

In the last years he also invited in Lecce some of the best zouk and samba dancers as Suellen Violante, Evelyn Magyari, Branca Carvalho, Ruana Vasquez, Eglantine Oliveira, Laisa Souza.

He is now interested in fusion techniques consisting in simultaneous use of techniques from different styles in a more free way, emphasizing connection and contact between leader and follower and physically and anatomically based dynamical concepts, for a wider interpretation of music out of a specific style.

He is also Ph.D. in physics, and works as researcher in atmospheric physics in the Italian National Research Council (CNR) in Lecce, Italy