 Francesco Bettoni is an acoustic guitar player, performer and arranger who has been interested in traditional Irish music since he was twenty years old. He was born in Brescia in 1978. Francesco lived in Gussago, a town in Franciacorta, a territory of the Province of Brescia very well known for its sparkling wine producers. He has been interested in music since he was eight, when he first attended piano and drum lessons, but it was only at the age of fifteen that he picked up his brother's electric guitar. He studied privately for the first two years. At eighteen he attended Brescia's Conservatory of Music, where he studied classical guitar under Master Gianluigi Fia. Highly inspired by the style of Michael Hedges, Alex de Grassi and John Renbourn, he turned his efforts into acoustic fingerstyle, which has studied with Walter Lupi.
 At the same time, he grew passion for traditional Irish music and, honestly he couldn't stop to listen to it! At the age of twenty four he moved to Ireland. He played in a lot of music sessions in Galway (where he regularly pays a visit), in Co. Clare and Co. Donegal, with local artists and some worldwide famous ones like Arty McGlynn, Ed Boyd, Paul Kelly. After two years he joined Inisfail, one of the most quoted traditional Irish music band in Italy, with whom he performed in the main traditional music festivals around Italy, Switzerland and France, sharing the stage with bands like Dervish, Altan, TriYann, Cara Dillon, Fine Friday, Hevia, Alan Kelly Quartet, Grada.
Up to the present he performed hundreds of gigs with his band as well as with other musicians and ran several Irish Guitar Workshops.
He now lives in Gussago (Brescia, Italy), where he teaches fingerstyle and flatpicking guitar.
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