Corrado Rustici - Integral Music and the Hierarchy of Spirit

Corrado Rustici is a pioneering guitarist in both progressive and fusion rock. He has performed with a range of artists, from Whitney Houston to Miles Davis to Zakir Hussein, and has acted as producer for some of the best selling musicians of all time, including Eric Clapton, Sinead O'Connor, Luciano Pavaroti, and Andrea Bocelli. In this exclusive interview with EnlightenNext founder (and fellow musician) Andrew Cohen, Corrado speaks about his past, his path, the nature of the creative heart, mind, and soul, and what he thinks integral music is—and could be. Their conversation proceeds with a natural ease and clarity, from the biographical to the philosophical and spiritual, interrupted only by music—with featured selections from Corrado's new album, Deconstruction of a Postmodern Musician, interspersed throughout. They close with a discussion of the ever-perplexing question of why some great artists can exemplify the highest attainments in their creative life yet in their personal life express something quite different, and why sometimes, in that rare confluence of God-given talent and personal character, an artist seeks to be aligned and unified, in thought and deed, with the infinite source of their creativity.

“A musician is, like everything else, a whole/part manifestation of the human cultural and spiritual place in this universe of context within context. He is also in the unusual position of being able to operate at many different levels of the Universal hierarchy. The Holonic musician—within the hierarchy of Spirit.” --Corrado Rustici

BIO

Corrado Rustici is a master guitarist, band leader, composer, and music producer. He has been involved with some of the most successful albums produced during the past twenty-five years, with a body of work that has surpassed 40 million unit sold. As a producer he has worked with such talents as Andrea Bocelli, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Luciano Pavoroti. As a musician, Corrado has played with such luminaries as Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock, Aretha Franklin, and Zakir Hussein.

Corrado's recent projects include producing a new album and single for the singer Elisa. The album debuted at the top of the Italian music charts, as did the single. In 2006 Corrado released his new solo album, “Deconstruction of a Postmodern Musician”, featuring Alan Holdsworth, Paul McCandless, and Steve Smith, among others. It is also the soundtrack to the film, “Un Amore Su Misura”.

Corrado's personal interest in integrating his musical life with his spiritual interests have led him to discover the Spiral Dynamics of Clare Graves and Don Beck, the integral theory of Ken Wilber, and the spirituo-philosophical inquiry of Andrew Cohen's EnlightenNext magazine.