PH: Giacomo Pucci / Atelier Ricci Lucca

Italian-German artist, Valentina, grew up in Lucca. Initially a pianist, she began playing the double bass in late 2009, graduating with honors from the L. Boccherini Music Institute in Lucca in October 2014. She then earned a Master of Performance (with honors) from the Royal College of Music in July 2016 and continued her studies at the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance under the guidance of Leon Bosch, receiving scholarships from Trinity College London and the Leverhulme Trust. In 2018 she was awarded the Trinity Laban Carne Trust Junior Fellowship for an Individual.

Valentina also focused her attention on composition, graduating in March 2014. Valentina has won several awards and prizes including first prize in the RCM Double Bass Competition 2016, the Vernon Elliot Double bass Competition 2018, the Vivian Joseph Classical Concerto Competition 2018, String Category and the De Simone and Partners prize in the Chamber Music Festival in Rome. Valentina also won a place with a scholarship in the Accademia Chigiana for summer 2018 with Maestro Giuseppe Ettorre. She was finalist in important national and international competitions such as the “Migliori Diplomati D’Italia” (best young Italian music graduate) 2015 and “Double bass international competition Galicia Garcia Graves. She was selected with other 16 young double bass players around the world to perform in the live final rounds at the worldwide double bass solo competition granted by “Bradetich Foundation” in Denton, Texas, at the end of august 2017. Valentina also won several orchestral auditions such as Gustav Mahler Academy 2016 and BBC SO training scheme.  She recently won the Artist in Residence at the BANFF, Alberta (Canada) that has hosted her from 15th till 28th September 2019. She gave solo performance with “I solisti veneti” with Maestro Claudio Scimone and she won the prestigious scholarship granted by this Academy (Proliber). She has performed as a soloist in the prestigious London concert halls Wigmore Hall and St. Martin in the Field and has been invited to the pre- opening of the Zappanale 2018 in St.Katharinen Kirche (Hamburg) with her Trio featuring the Worldwide saxophone virtuoso Napoleon Murphy Brock. Additionally, Valentina has been invited to perform at important institutions and has received commissions as a composer from organizations such as the Agnelli Foundation in Turin and Italian Cultural Institutes in Washington DC, Hannover, and Stuttgart.

Currently, Valentina lives in London and is a double bass professor at the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance and she is the owner of the brand How I met Puccini® She also has extensive experience in jazz, performing at major jazz festivals such as the Dusseldorf Jazz Marathon, Villa Celimontana Jazz Festival, Tuscia Jazz, and Umbria Jazz Clinics, and reaching the finals in competitions such as Tuscia Jazz as the best double bass and electric bass player and the Nicola Tiberio Awards in 2012. She plays a 2014 Scipioni double bass made in Mantua and is a D'Addario artist.

Valentina also has a wide Jazz experience playing in important Jazz Festival such as Dusseldorf Jazz Marathon, Villa Celimontana Jazz Festival, Tuscia Jazz, Umbria Jazz Clinics and she got to final in competition such as Tuscia Jazz as Best double bass and electric bass player and Nicola Tiberio Awards in 2012. She plays a 2014 Scipioni Bass made in Mantua.