Andy Digelsomina

"Lyraka is wagnerian opera metal, defined" 

New music coming soon!

Andy DiGelsomina (pronounced "DEE-Jehl-Soh-ME-nah") is a composer and lead guitar player. He has been a lifelong admirer of Ritchie Blackmore, and is an avid enthusiast of the composer Richard Wagner.

Andy hears a link between the powerful expression of Richard Wagner and the music genre called heavy metal. One can hear this link in many forms, from the passionate music of bands like Manowar, Judas Priest, Deep Purple, Rainbow, Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, and Death, to the unique, unmistakable guitar styles of players like Ritchie Blackmore and Michael Schenker.
Andy considers large portions of Wagner's works to be more heavy metal than practically anything since. Though it's commonly accepted that Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath invented guitar-driven heavy metal, Richard Wagner was the father of the musical genre itself.

Andy's favorite pieces of erudite music are Ludwig van Beethoven's Opus 132 and of course Richard Wagner's opera Der Ring des Nibelungen.

Back to guitar metal! Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow was Andy's first metal album and to this day he loves the music of the 1970's era of Rainbow above any other Rock/Metal. This favoritism encompasses the albums from the Ronnie James Dio and Graham Bonnet periods exclusively. Andy's favorite guitar player is Ritchie Blackmore, and his favorite song is "Stargazer". Blackmore's playing on the track "Man on the Silver Mountain" sparked Andy's interest in in baroque, classical, and romantic music.

Though Ritchie Blackmore has been Andy's biggest lead guitar inspiration, it was actually Tony Iommi's playing on the first Black Sabbath album that motivated him to begin studying the electric guitar. In particular, the song "Warning" from that album featured an intensely personal, improvised-sounding lead guitar part that Andy felt he had to learn. The most important thing that Andy learned from this solo was to play with feeling (heart) first, with technique (mind) a distant second.

Guitar had intimidated Andy before hearing Tony, because players like Blackmore and Michael Schenker sounded incredibly advanced. Tony Iommi had formidable skill, but his style lent itself to making a young guitar player think, "Hey, I can do that!" Tony Iommi has remained a giant of guitar and both him and Black Sabbath have remained favorites of Andy's ever since.

In regard to other metal gods, Andy became a fan of Judas Priest in 1977, when he purchased a cut-out vinyl copy of Sad Wings of Destiny. This was an early period in the band's career, when few others in the U.S. even knew who they were. The music of Judas Priest imposes a powerful influence on him to this very day.

Andy has cherished the music of Manowar since their 1984 release, Hail to England. He has watched admiringly as Manowar became more Wagnerian with each release, culminating in an unbeatable peak with their 2007 album, Gods Of War. Today they stand unmatched in Wagnerian Metal.

In 1986, after Andy had been playing guitar for over two years, he was introduced to the albums Rainbow Rising and Michael Schenker Group's Assault Attack. This constituted the most significant event in Andy's playing and writing since he first picked up the guitar. Though he had been a fan of Rainbow and Michael Schenker for years, he had been unaware of those particular albums (both releases had mainly been popular overseas). Andy was struck by how musically involved those albums were; that his beloved Metal could be so musical. From that point on, those albums became a spiritual thing to Andy; he dreamed of someday composing and playing music as involved and dramatic as that on Rising and Assault Attack. Those albums seemed to him to have so much more drama and personality than the neo-classical trend that followed them in the 1980's. Andy wanted to start up an organic, flowing style of Wagnerian metal, with both Metal and Opera singers involved. This goal has resulted in the groundbreaking music of Lyraka. Although Andy became infatuated with erudite music relatively recently, he never got over the influence he received from his favorite Metal acts.

Here, Andy pays tribute to the cover of one of the biggest musical influences of his life: Assault Attack.

Andy says that his life really started when he met Jasmine. before then, he had given up even music.

In case you hadn't guessed, Andy is crazy about rainbows. One of Andy's favorite songs is, Catch The Rainbow. In realizing his twenty-five year dream of working with living legend, Graham Bonnet, Andy feels he has really "caught the rainbow".

Andy sums up his feelings for Graham with this statement: "The Lyraka material is the style of music that I think is perfectly matched for Graham Bonnet's voice. As evidenced by Graham's classic Desert Song, Graham's voice is perfect for Epic Metal; not to mention 50's and 60's rock, rhythm and blues, jazz, hard rock and even extreme metal! He remains one of the elite world class hard rock and metal vocalists. Many people aren't as familiar with Graham's non-belting singing voice, which can be even more moving. Bottom line, the resoundingly individual tone, flexibility, creativity, and nuance of Graham's voice makes it an invaluable instrument. Even better, Graham throughout my experience with him, has proven to be that rarest of individuals: dependable, trustworthy, and extremely kind. Working with Graham, the singer for my favorite band ever (Rainbow), is truly my dream come true."

Andy plays a customized '70's Fender Stratocaster with jumbo Gibson frets and DiMarzio HS pickups. His gear includes a DOD 308 pedal, Dunlop Bad Horsie Wah, and a BOSS NS-2 Noise Suppressor. His amplifiers of choice are Marshall DSL 2000 and Marshall JCM 800.

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Lyraka.com © Jasmine Lyraka 2009 / Music © Andy DiGelsomina 2009 All Rights Reserved.

All music samples, songs and sketches on Lyraka.com are rough mixes and are not indicative of the final product, and therefore will not be our loss nor your personal gain if you decide to commit the crime of piracy.