The story of Sir Oliver Skardy, born in Venice as Gaetano Scardicchio the 14th of June 1959, sign of the zodiac: twins, has been, for the last more than twenty years, indissolubly tied up to the story of the most popular reggae Italian band, PITURA FRESKA.

The popularity given from the Sanremo Festival, united to the overwhelming communicative purity of Skardy have done of him, sometimes despite him, a character popular with an extremely transversal public: considered from time to time as the "mayor" of the redeeming Marghera, the ensign of marijuana legalization, the spokesman of musicians neglected by mass media for lack of sex appeal, the prominent exponent of the Venetian musical movement, Skardy represents for the everybody the "popular" soul of an Italian song tied up to the outskirts and the desire of redemption and social peace.

From the basements of Marghera where he begins to play guitar with the "legendary" friend Ciuke, passing through "the flash of inspiration" on the way to Siro Siro Stadium, where Marley showed him the way of reggae (that Skardy will decline in Venetian dialect), to the meeting with the "Venetians" (Valerio Silvestri, Marco Forieri and Cristiano Verardo) who, along with Francesco Duse, will became the definitive line-up of Pitura Freska that had so much success, the story of Sir Oliver Skardy is that of a passion for music first, and then for reggae in particular, conjugated with the spontaneous and enthralling expression of his lyrics that allowed thousands of fans to be passionate for, and to participate to the "histories" of ordinary everyday life narrated often with the disenchantment and humour of a first-class author.

Skardy, has been the soul of the band; with his enthralling communicative force he has made Pitura Freska the most important band of the Venetian musical scene with a popularity that has gone beyond the social extraction or musical tastes of the his generation. Since it is unimaginable that was reggae to demolish those barriers, the true reason must be found into Skardy's lyrics composing ability; he knows how to communicate through his texts, in Venetian dialect and in Italian, his personality, speaking sincerely of his way of seeing politics, love, news stories and actuality, everything seasoned by expressions of sincere "popular anger" and a notable dose of self-irony and musical taste.
Success, begun at local level during the 80's, has then expanded in the rest of Italy so much that the four albums of the band sold over 350.000 copies conquering two platinum and two gold records.

The extraordinary composing vein of Skardy has produced some of the songs that are now part of the history of Italian music as the extraordinary fresco on Pink Floyd concert in Venice "Pin Floi", or the hymn of a whole city, and then of the anti-prohibitionist movement, "Marghera"; another hit "Picinin" played recently on the television stage of Zelig, the comic strip in music of "La pianta" and "Le sorti de un Pianeta" that will become, many years later the testimonial of a campaign for Emergency. To return to the legalization battle with "Olanda" and to arrive at the refrain of "Papa nero" that has been on every adult and children mouth.

During his career with Pitura Freska he has signed many albums: NA BRUTA BANDA (91), extraordinary success frankly reggae; DURI I BANCHI (93), rich of rhythms and tastes from the whole world; YEAH (95), to mark the return to the reggae of the first album with an increased composing ability and the "brother" YEAH In DUB (96) with his revisit in a Dub key and the production of Peter Mash of Aswad; GRAN CALMA (97), the album of the consecration at the Festival of Sanremo. To be also mentioned PIATTI ROVENTI (99), record result of the project I PIATTI ROVENTI il Sound System dei PITURA FRESKA, review in a dance key of the band hits, and the long awaited double live album OLIVE VOL. 1 & 2 showing the energy and the emotional power expressed on stage by the band and that have determined the success of its concerts on the stages of the peninsula.

As in many marriages however, the life in common of Pitura Freska during the years started to get tight. Many individual projects begun to take form, Skardy in particular was always attracted toward new roads and collaborations, that have already seen him "to duet" with Elio e le storie tese or Raul Casadei and its Orchestra Italiana, to act with Anna Galiena, Alessandro Haber and Roberto Citran in Maurizio Zaccaro's movie "Cervellini fritti impanati", or to start a solo project with the single "President Buana" realized in collaboration with Mauro Ferrucci (producer of Moony and Db Boulevard).

But also those "parallel" activities were not enough, Skardy needed more room and so, at the end of 2002, the split of the group is decided: Pitura Freska doesn't exist anymore! They pass from the chronicle to the history of music, and Skardy takes by full right their inheritance returning to dress the clothes of Sir Oliver Skardy ("stage name" used by Skardy writing his personal chronicle of the "Mostra del Cinema di Venezia" on the columns of "Il Gazzettino") and beginning a new course.

After the first live anticipations, that have seen him participating to the most important national musical kermesses as Arezzo Wave in 2003, the "controfestival" Mantova Musica Festival and the Rototom Sunsplash in 2004, Sir Oliver Skardy has been involved into the release of a new record (autumn 2004) destined to propose a new musical turn for the "poet from Marghera." The record called "Grande Bidello" (big school janitor), produced by alma music and distributed by Venus, offers new themes for his innate ability to tell in just few sincere sentences what all of us would like to know how to say, with the simplicity and genuineness of his own and with that incisiveness and efficacy that have always allowed him to reach the heart of the people.