Biography
Maria Pia de Vito, an Italian singer, arranger, and multi-instrumentalist, has earned recognition equally for her spontaneous improvisations and her interpretations of jazz standards alongside folk material drawn from many countries.
Born in Naples during 1960, she began structured vocal training while still a child, immersing herself in opera, classical repertoire, and the traditional songs of her native region.
Her professional appearances started in 1976 within assorted workshop groups, where she performed as a vocalist while accompanying herself first on guitar and subsequently on piano; those initial explorations centered on polyphonic textures and folk traditions spanning the Mediterranean, the Balkans, and South America.
By 1980 she had entered jazz circles, collaborating with such prominent figures as Paolo Fresu, Bruno Tommaso, and Gianluigi Trovesi, and she subsequently shared stages at clubs and festivals worldwide with Joe Zawinul, Michael Brecker, Peter Erskine, Miroslav Vitous, Uri Caine, Dave Liebman, Billy Hart, Steve Turre, Maria Joao, the Art Ensemble of Chicago, and Nguyen-Le, moving fluidly among bop and post-bop readings of the Great American Songbook, freely improvised singing, classical and neo-classical works, and the world-music elements she had absorbed earlier.
Her recording debut came in 1987 when she led the Tino Tracanna Sextet on Mr. Frankenstein Blues; two years later she issued her first album under her own name, Hit the Beast. International touring followed, along with appearances on numerous sessions by Italian jazz musicians, among them Ernesto Vitolo’s Piano & Bit and RCA releases featuring Mike Stern and Toots Thielemans.
A fresh chapter opened in 1994 through a venture devised and co-led with Rita Marcotulli that treated vocal sound itself as an expressive vehicle within the meeting of jazz and Neapolitan song, yielding the albums Nauplia in 1995 and Fore Paese in 1996.
In 1997 De Vito recorded Phoné with pianist John Taylor, Trovesi, and additional colleagues, drawing repertoire that extended from the Italian Renaissance to the African Congo; the program was later presented at the Umbria Jazz Festival. The following year she rejoined Marcotulli and multi-instrumentalist Arto Tuncboyaciyan for Triboh, while also fronting Tracanna’s ensemble on the landmark Gesualdo, a contemporary jazz reflection on the music of the Italian madrigal composer. In 1999 she contributed to Still Life with Colin Towns’ Mask Quintet and, together with Norma Winstone, headed the seventy-piece Mask Symphonic ensemble on Dreaming Man with Blue Suede Shoes.
Throughout the late 1990s she toured festivals in a trio completed by pianist John Taylor and guitarist Ralph Towner, releasing the debut Verso on Provocateur in 1998 and the follow-up Nel Respiro a year later. In 2003 she issued her own Tumulti, supported by Ernst Reijseger, Patrice Heral, and Paul Urbanek.
During the next two seasons she participated in Tommaso-directed projects Lettere da Orsara and Specula et Gemini alongside the Orchestra Jazz a Maiella. In 2005 she joined David Linx, Diederik Wissels, and Fay Claassen on One Heart, Three Voices, while her own So Right appeared on Cam Jazz. Songs from the Underground followed in 2007, then Mind the Gap in 2009, an experimental work fusing free-form jazz, traditional European music, pop songs, and abstract electronica.
De Vito maintained an active schedule of collaborations and touring in subsequent years. Her ECM debut, Il Pergolese, arrived in 2013 with Francois Couturier, Anja Lechner, and Michele Rabbia. In 2017 she returned with Core, a Brazilian-jazz-inflected recording that featured guests Chico Buarque, Gabriele Mirabassi, Roberto Taufic, and others.
Born in Naples during 1960, she began structured vocal training while still a child, immersing herself in opera, classical repertoire, and the traditional songs of her native region.
Her professional appearances started in 1976 within assorted workshop groups, where she performed as a vocalist while accompanying herself first on guitar and subsequently on piano; those initial explorations centered on polyphonic textures and folk traditions spanning the Mediterranean, the Balkans, and South America.
By 1980 she had entered jazz circles, collaborating with such prominent figures as Paolo Fresu, Bruno Tommaso, and Gianluigi Trovesi, and she subsequently shared stages at clubs and festivals worldwide with Joe Zawinul, Michael Brecker, Peter Erskine, Miroslav Vitous, Uri Caine, Dave Liebman, Billy Hart, Steve Turre, Maria Joao, the Art Ensemble of Chicago, and Nguyen-Le, moving fluidly among bop and post-bop readings of the Great American Songbook, freely improvised singing, classical and neo-classical works, and the world-music elements she had absorbed earlier.
Her recording debut came in 1987 when she led the Tino Tracanna Sextet on Mr. Frankenstein Blues; two years later she issued her first album under her own name, Hit the Beast. International touring followed, along with appearances on numerous sessions by Italian jazz musicians, among them Ernesto Vitolo’s Piano & Bit and RCA releases featuring Mike Stern and Toots Thielemans.
A fresh chapter opened in 1994 through a venture devised and co-led with Rita Marcotulli that treated vocal sound itself as an expressive vehicle within the meeting of jazz and Neapolitan song, yielding the albums Nauplia in 1995 and Fore Paese in 1996.
In 1997 De Vito recorded Phoné with pianist John Taylor, Trovesi, and additional colleagues, drawing repertoire that extended from the Italian Renaissance to the African Congo; the program was later presented at the Umbria Jazz Festival. The following year she rejoined Marcotulli and multi-instrumentalist Arto Tuncboyaciyan for Triboh, while also fronting Tracanna’s ensemble on the landmark Gesualdo, a contemporary jazz reflection on the music of the Italian madrigal composer. In 1999 she contributed to Still Life with Colin Towns’ Mask Quintet and, together with Norma Winstone, headed the seventy-piece Mask Symphonic ensemble on Dreaming Man with Blue Suede Shoes.
Throughout the late 1990s she toured festivals in a trio completed by pianist John Taylor and guitarist Ralph Towner, releasing the debut Verso on Provocateur in 1998 and the follow-up Nel Respiro a year later. In 2003 she issued her own Tumulti, supported by Ernst Reijseger, Patrice Heral, and Paul Urbanek.
During the next two seasons she participated in Tommaso-directed projects Lettere da Orsara and Specula et Gemini alongside the Orchestra Jazz a Maiella. In 2005 she joined David Linx, Diederik Wissels, and Fay Claassen on One Heart, Three Voices, while her own So Right appeared on Cam Jazz. Songs from the Underground followed in 2007, then Mind the Gap in 2009, an experimental work fusing free-form jazz, traditional European music, pop songs, and abstract electronica.
De Vito maintained an active schedule of collaborations and touring in subsequent years. Her ECM debut, Il Pergolese, arrived in 2013 with Francois Couturier, Anja Lechner, and Michele Rabbia. In 2017 she returned with Core, a Brazilian-jazz-inflected recording that featured guests Chico Buarque, Gabriele Mirabassi, Roberto Taufic, and others.
Albums
It's Christmas Time
2024
Coplas a lo divino
2024
Il Pergolese
2013
'O pata pata
2011
So Right
2005
Tumulti
2003
Live
