“Music has always been a refuge, an ever-present distraction from everyday reality, but also a way of becoming more and more aware of this reality”. Sirio Martelli was born in Florence in the Campo di Marte district on 8 Nov 1979. As an adolescent he was given an old guitar and a four-track tape recorder, and he began to experiment with the first compositions. His musical tastes are inspired by pop-rock and new-wave sounds of different types of artists including XtC, David Bowie and Radiohead. On the Italian music scene, he was fascinated by Lucio Battisti and his communicative force and by Franco Battiato and his experimental adventurousness. In the early ’noughties he became the solo singer of the Ultraviolet (a well-known Tuscan U2 tribute-band), and had his first experiences of live performance. In 2004, his song “Sweet song” was directed by the young Indonesian film director Andrea Indriani (supervised by Giuseppe Ferlito) for the Immagina cinema school of Florence.
In 2007 he met the producer and author Giancarlo Bigazzi, his wife Gianna and his son Giovanni, through the arranger Fabrizio Federighi. It was the beginning of a true friendship with Giancarlo, and a concrete collaboration based on the analysis and study of the artistic relationship between music and lyrics.
In 2009 one of his songs,” Che ne sai di me” was presented at the Sanremo Festival  Newcomers’ Section by Barbara Gilbo and Massimo Ranieri.
In time Sirio’s creativity blended more and more harmoniously with the experience of Maestro Bigazzi and at the beginning of 2010, thanks to the collaboration of the arranger Matteo Giannetti, the repertoire of songs was selected for the project of the first album, entitled “Inutilmente Utile”.
The tracks were recorded and mixed at the Koan Studio of Florence and masterised at the White Sound Mastering Studio between 2011 and the beginning of 2012, just after the death of Giancarlo, who had been Sirio’s mentor and the creator of a timeless idea. “Some songs convey determination, force, others nourish you inwardly….there are songs which match every state of mind and manifest their maximum fascination in their understanding”. “Inutilmente utile” is a progressive build-up of different passions and gifts, an idea which has become a record. A sincere meeting of kindred spirits, Sirio and Giancarlo and Giovanni Bigazzi, which has generated a unique emotion-filled project, a blend of social irony and inner feeling.