Meet Paolo Cairoli

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Paolo Cairoli a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Paolo, first a big thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts and insights with us today. I’m sure many of our readers will benefit from your wisdom, and one of the areas where we think your insight might be most helpful is related to imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome is holding so many people back from reaching their true and highest potential and so we’d love to hear about your journey and how you overcame imposter syndrome.

I began my career as a pianist, dedicating many years of my early education to classical music training. Playing the piano was exciting, but by the end of my twenties, I realized my true passion lay in communicating about music and culture—sharing its stories and deeper meanings, especially with those who might not fully appreciate its significance. That’s when I discovered I’m definitely not a pianist! Today, I work as a communication manager and PR specialist for classical music and culture, and life feels much more aligned.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

I first started working as PR and Communication Manager for the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della Rai and then for artists and other musical and cultural institutions. I went on to create a communication agency, Skill & Music, that specializes in the cultural sector, and operates both in Italy and abroad. For over ten years the agency has been busy giving the best visibility to quality cultural projects. I live between Italy – Rome and Turin – and the United States, with a base in Los Angeles. Together with a group of professionals we work with artists like pianist Lang Lang, stage director Damiano Michieletto, conductor Daniele Gatti, singers Lisette Oropesa and Marina Rebeka, and institutions like the Arena di Verona, the Wexford Festival, Oman’s Opera House, the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, the Monteverdi Festival, and several others. Music, culture, new and traditional media are the center of our activities. We like to think that our job is a continuous opportunity for training, growth, and personal development. Over the past two years I have also been managing director of “Calibano”, a cultural studies magazine published in Italy by effequ and the Opera di Roma, dedicated to topical issues connected to operas: racial discrimination in Aida, post-human in Mefistofele, diversity and the outsider in Peter Grimes, power in Simon Boccanegra, to mention a few.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

The most important qualities in our job are the aptitude to select the strongest news involving our clients for media exposure, and the ability to present them properly and to spread them to all kinds of media platforms. This is all connected to a love for music and culture in general, as well as love for journalism. Both of Skill & Music’s other two project managers, Irene Sala and Firmina Adorno, and myself, share the same media and musical education (piano was our first training!) which we invest in the projects we believe in. We have a group of people working with us who possess high organizational and strategic skills and who share our very desire to highlight the cultural products we dedicate ourselves to.

How would you describe your ideal client?

Our ideal clients are artists who have an eye for the quality of their work and a desire to deliver it in the most effective and appropriate way possible; artists who have a personality and a history that can be told. And obviously cultural institutions that aim to promote their product and make it more visible, or bring it to different market segments. But we also work on other projects: we create bridges between Italy and international institutions, often in collaboration with diplomatic offices, and we have also worked on the laying of the star dedicated to Luciano Pavarotti on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame. It was fun!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.skillandmusic.com
• Instagram: skillandmusic
• Facebook: Skill&Music

Image Credits

Fabrizio Sansoni (profile photo)