Marco Ceciliato, known as Ceci, is an Italian electronic music producer whose work moves through melodic and progressive house while drawing on a broader musical background that includes years as a guitarist and live performer.
Photo credit: Ceci – Official
His releases have appeared on labels including Sommersville Records, Manual Music, Songspire Records, Sekora, Worlds Up Records, Hathōr, Blue Magenta Records, Saifam Group, Monowave Records, Golden Hour Recordings, Kumo Collective, and Artist Intelligence Agency.
His album ‘Peace’ brings together music created over several years, tracing a period shaped by collaboration, evolving production techniques, and an increasingly defined relationship with melody.
In this conversation, Ceci reflects on his earliest musical memories, artistic maturity, working with other artists, industry pressures, and what the idea of peace means to him now.
EG: Hi Ceci, welcome to Electronic Groove. Where are you today, and what kind of energy are you bringing into this conversation?
Ceci: Thanks, Electronic Groove! Today I’m in my studio, working on new music. Lately I’ve been feeling really motivated: no matter the commitments life keeps throwing at you, I don’t want to stop chasing new stimuli, having fun, and creating new moments.
EG: Before genres, labels, and ambitions entered the picture, what is your earliest memory of music making you feel something you could not explain?
Ceci: I think there are several memories that made me feel something I couldn’t explain. But I definitely remember when I started listening to music on MTV (I was very young). I didn’t have digital devices, so I could only listen to it and watch the videos on TV. In summer, when I wasn’t at school, I’d spend whole mornings, sometimes whole days, in front of it. I didn’t understand why I liked it so much. Maybe I wanted to be like “the ones who played.” In a way, that feeling has never really left me.
EG: When you revisit music created by earlier versions of yourself, what do you hear now that you were unable to recognize at the time?
Ceci: I definitely feel the artistic maturity I have today. Back then I was searching, kind of blindly, but that search turned out to be useful over time. Sometimes I go back and listen to old tracks, and I still feel, in some moments, emotions I probably had years ago. I like to think that whole journey helped me become who I am now.
EG: ‘Peace’ brings together several years of your life. Was there a particular moment when these individual pieces stopped feeling like separate tracks and began to reveal a larger portrait of who you are?
Ceci: The idea of ‘Peace’ actually came after I’d already written most of the tracks. I don’t think there was a real conscious thread running through it from the start; if anything, it kind of created itself along the way. But if you listen to it as a journey, you can hear an evolution: especially in the later tracks, there’s a clear shift in style compared to the earlier ones. It was more time that revealed the coherence than something I deliberately built.
EG: The album’s title suggests stillness, but creative growth is often uncomfortable and restless. What does peace actually mean to you at this stage of your life?
Ceci: I’ve noticed that creative growth only feels uncomfortable when you force it. If you’re enjoying something that comes naturally to you, you might as well follow the flow and see where it leads. That’s how it went with this album. Right now, “peace” for me means this: having freedom, and knowing you can face even the things that seem difficult. Peace gives you awareness, and awareness gives you strength.
“Peace gives you awareness, and awareness gives you strength”
EG: How has your relationship with melody changed as you have matured, both as a producer and as a person?
Ceci: I think that today, more than in the past, I feel the need, in every track, to find a lead melody. It wasn’t like that for me before, maybe because technically I wasn’t mature enough yet. But now, regardless of the technical side, I think melody gives you direction: it helps you produce the track and, in a way, it guides you. Maybe, as I grow, I’m trying to become a guide for myself. And the more beautiful the melody, the better the guide, right?
EG: Collaboration can reveal instincts that might remain hidden when working alone. What have other artists taught you about your own creative identity?
Ceci: Collaborating has helped me a lot in seeing some of my own ideas turned upside down, in a good way. It’s also taught me that my instinct always leans toward melody, harmony, and emotion, even when I’m working with artists who are more groove-or sound-design oriented. There’s another thing collaboration takes care of: perfectionism. When you’re stuck in that vicious circle of “the track is never finished,” having someone else there really helps you realize when it actually is. And behind collaborations, in 90% of cases, unique human relationships are born.
EG: Do you remember the first time someone you deeply respected supported your music? What did that moment change within you, beyond the obvious career validation?
Ceci: When my music ended up on Tiësto’s radio show, alongside artists at the highest level, I told myself: not bad! That’s when I understood that if it had gotten there, it could, and still can, go anywhere.
EG: Electronic music today rewards constant visibility and an uninterrupted flow of releases. How do you protect the patience and privacy needed to make something meaningful?
Ceci: I’m not really into promoting content on social media; I only create it around the time of a release. I try to preserve my privacy and patience as much as possible, since I’m someone who often gets distracted (and not just by social media). Still, I do recognize the potential of social platforms, and how the system can put an artist in the spotlight in a short amount of time. In exchange, I release a lot of music: this year alone, for example, I’ve already put out more than 10 tracks. And I’ll definitely release more.
EG: What do you believe the melodic and progressive scene needs more of right now, and what could it afford to leave behind?
Ceci: I think it’s a great time for the melodic scene. If I had to say one thing, it’s that sometimes the structure of the tracks themselves- I mean the arrangements – could be shaken up a bit more. Today there’s a tendency to shorten everything to grab the listener’s attention, and that’s fair enough, but in some cases having the track run 30 seconds or a minute longer wouldn’t hurt.
“My instinct always leans toward melody, harmony, and emotion”
EG: What has been the most unexpected piece of advice, experience, or failure to shape the artist you are today?
Ceci: I’ve received a ton of “no’s,” and once you start seeing them as something useful, everything becomes part of a bigger journey. There’s also a great piece of advice I was given: teamwork is key to getting great results. You have to believe in yourself more than anyone else, but working as a team gives you huge results, bigger than what you could get on your own, in most cases.
EG: Imagine you could speak to yourself at sixteen, just as music was beginning to take over your life. What would you tell that version of yourself, and what would you deliberately allow him to discover alone?
Ceci: I’d tell him to never stop believing in it, to always do what he feels like doing, even when it seems like no one believes in it as much as he does. And I’d let him discover on his own the surprises that music holds, because music can bring surprises even outside of itself: in life, not just in a career. Music can give you so much.
EG: Finally, once ‘Peace’ is released and this chapter belongs to the listeners, which unexplored side of yourself would you most like to follow next?
Ceci: I’m at a stage where I still don’t fully know. I definitely have some productions in progress that’ll come out this year, in a style close to the album’s. But the next few months, for me, will mostly be about searching, the way they were years ago, when I first started. I’m going back to my roots a little. We’ll see what happens.
EG: Thanks for your time and all the best!
Ceci: Thanks to you, EG.
Ceci’s ‘Peace’ is out now via Sommersville Records. Stream and download your copy here.
