General Services Assistant, Administration

Photo: Dennis Keeley.

Matthew Nanni is the GCI's general services assistant, providing general office support for the staff, including the purchasing and stocking of supplies.

Matthew's father—an Italian electronics engineer—met Matthew's mother—an American working in Holland for a record company—in 1960, and together they went to the United States the following year. Matthew was born three years later on Kwajelein Atoll in the Marshall Islands, where his father was then working as a contractor at the atoll's U.S. military tracking station. In Matthew's early childhood, the family lived in the United States, Britain, France, and Italy, coming home to stay in Massachusetts in 1969.

Music has always been a major part of his life. He remembers seeing the Beatles' film Yellow Submarine in Milan when he was four, which inspired an early love of music. His home was filled with music—his father liked opera and classical music, his mother loved jazz. Matthew took up the violin briefly in elementary school, and then, in the 8th grade, he bought an electric bass after listening to a lot of rhythm and blues and reggae. He started his first band shortly thereafter.

In the mid-1980s, Matthew attended the Berklee College of Music in Boston, and in the summer of 1988, he toured Tuscany with a band formed at school. Returning home, he worked at local music venues and private events. In 1992 he was hired as the bass player for an established group and again went on tour, this time to Spain and Norway. Back in Boston, he once more played with local bands, developing an interest in jazz and fusion.

By 1994 he wanted a change, and he moved to Los Angeles, where he quickly found work with the GCI. His involvement with music did not end, and in his first few years in L.A., he played with a number of bands at a variety of local venues. Between 1998 and 2002, he had a more regular group, which performed blues, rock, and jazz.

Matthew enjoys the balance of GCI work and music. He takes an interest in the progress of the Institute's projects and in the variety of people at the GCI—regular staff and visitors. At the same time, as part of his ongoing studies, he continues to spend a lot of time listening to music and transcribing recorded jazz and other styles of music for electric bass. He recently formed a jazz trio.