Matteo Mancuso is one of those rare guitar players who come along maybe once in a generation and stop you dead in your tracks. Tosin Abasi was not wrong when he called Mancuso “the virtuoso of virtuosos”. The unassuming Sicilian is just 26 years old but his debut album, The Journey, is sure to be a reference text for instrumental guitar.
You can pick out the influences but they are all over the map and in different contexts. There is traditional jazz in there. There is fusion. There is rock. Above all there are big moods, and the virtuosity is so casual and matter of fact that it doesn’t call attention to itself until you come to and find that you’ve been unconsciously holding your breath for the past dozen bars.
