Gilardino was born in Vercelli, Italy, on 16 November 1941.During his concert career, from 1958 to 1981, he premiered hundreds of new works for the guitar. Among his premieres was John Duarte's Mutations on Dies Irae in 1974. He taught at the Liceo Musicale G. B. Viotti in Vercelli from 1965 to 1981, and held a professorship at the Antonio Vivaldi Conservatory in Alessandria from 1981 to 2004. The Conservatory awarded him the Marengo Music Prize in 1998.