Luca Turilli

Luca Turilli (born 5 March 1972) is an Italian musician (primarily a guitarist) and songwriter. He is one of the founders of the symphonic power metal band Rhapsody of Fire. He also worked on a trilogy of solo albums as Luca Turilli, and released one album under the name of Luca Turilli's Dreamquest, a project he worked on alongside Dominique Leurquin. In 2008, Luca began an online guitar course titled Luca Turilli's Neoclassical Revelation. The course takes its name from his neoclassical playing style.

On every Rhapsody of Fire album, Luca is the only lyricist and composes all the music with the keyboardist, Alex Staropoli (except for Il Canto del Vento written, lyrics and music, by the vocalist, Fabio Lione) and plays most of the lead guitars. He composes all the music for both his solo projects. He plays guitars on his solo trilogy and keyboards with Luca Turilli's Dreamquest featuring Dominique Leurquin as the guitarist.

On August 2011, Turilli and Staropoli proceeded to a friendly split. Alex agreed to go on as Rhapsody of Fire, while Luca decided to move on as Luca Turilli's Rhapsody, adding his name on top of the logo because of copyright reasons and old legal settlements and stopping definitely the Luca Turilli band.

Gear
Turilli uses custom "Luca Turilli" electric guitars made by the French luthier Christophe Capelli. He has four of them (blue, black, red and white). Specifications: His signature guitars feature a Seymour Duncan pickup in the bridge position and DiMarzio Humbucker from Hell in the neck position. The model of the bridge pickup is subject to some debate because in the "Live Equipment" section of Rhapsody of Fire's "Visions from the Enchanted Lands" DVD, Luca states it is a Seymour Duncan "TB-H" but there is no such model. Some fans incorrectly assumed that "H" was a mispronunciation of "8" meaning TB-8 (Seymour Duncan Invader), however the Invader has much larger polepieces than a normal humbucker and as such is easily recognisable. The pickup Luca shows is NOT an Invader, but it is certainly a trem-spaced Seymour Duncan humbucker, hence the TB. They also feature maple necks, 22 fret ebony fingerboards with a custom "Tree of Life" inlays and Ibanez Lo-Pro Edge tremolo systems. The wood used for the body is unknown, but since he has used Ibanez S540 LTD and FGM models in the past, it is likely to be mahogany.

He has been known to use Mesa Boogie amplifiers, Line 6 HD147 amplifiers (used for the recording of Triumph or Agony) and Marshall cabs. During his last tour in 2011 he has been seeing playing through an ENGL Powerball II.

Biography
Turilli was born in Trieste, Venezia Giulia. Due to the influence of his father, he became interested in classical music and learned to play piano and guitar.

In 1993, Turilli survived cancer at age 16. The same year, he founded the band Thundercross, which was renamed Rhapsody after releasing the first demo, and renamed once again to Rhapsody of Fire for copyright reasons in 2006.

In interviews, he has said that Manowar, Blind Guardian, Helloween, and Crimson Glory are influences on him and the rest of Rhapsody Of Fire.

Playing style
Luca Turilli is considered one of the most influential and prominent modern power metal guitarists. He is influenced by guitarists such as Yngwie Malmsteen and Jason Becker with his neo-classical structuring and phrasing. His lead playing often includes extensive use of sweep picked arpeggios, tremolo picking, classically influenced phrases, and scales such as aeolian, harmonic minor, phrygian mode, locrian, and melodic minor. In his latest albums he introduced new ethnic elements too (Hirajoshi and Pentatonic scales).

Luca Turilli

 * King of the Nordic Twilight (1999)
 * Prophet of the Last Eclipse (2002)
 * ''Demonheart (2002) - EP
 * The Infinite Wonders of Creation (2006)

Luca Turilli's Dreamquest

 * Lost Horizons (2006)

Rhapsody of Fire

 * Legendary Tales (1997)
 * Symphony of Enchanted Lands (1998)
 * Dawn of Victory (2000)
 * Rain of a Thousand Flames (2001)
 * Power of the Dragonflame (2002)
 * The Dark Secret (2004) – EP
 * The Magic of the Wizard's Dream (2005) - EP
 * Symphony of Enchanted Lands II: The Dark Secret (2004)
 * Live in Canada 2005: The Dark Secret (2006)
 * Triumph or Agony (2006)
 * The Frozen Tears of Angels (2010)
 * The Cold Embrace of Fear – A Dark Romantic Symphony (2010)
 * From Chaos to Eternity (2011)

Luca Turilli's Rhapsody

 * Ascending to Infinity (2012)

Guest Appearances

 * Kamelot – Epica (Guitar solo on "Descent of the Archangel")
 * Dyslesia - Who Dares Wins (Guitar solo on "Unknown Fighter")