Sicily. Province of Catania, more precisely Jonia. March 23, 1945. It is born Franco Battiato, one of the most eclectic protagonists of Italian music. Philosophical music, but never snobbish, elegance and experimentation. These are some of the words that describe Franco Battiato's musical research. From sound experiments to the most catchy pop, from electronics to opera, through cinema, the Sicilian singer-songwriter has been able to cross the decades and tastes by launching fashions and reinterpreting their signs. Mothers whiten but his records are timeless. And on his birthday it seemed right to pay homage to him by remembering some of his most beautiful records with you.
My Desert Session
It is not easy to choose a handful of records from the immense production of the master from Catania, all of which are of the highest level. But imagining having to go to the desert with three of his records, I have no doubts. The first is The master's voice 1981. My memories of this record go back to the box in my father's car. He who listened to the great classics of Italian music such as Battisti and Villa hummed Cuckoo-cuckoo. The power of intelligent and measured pop by Battiato! The unmissable song on this record? For me New feeling, because love is that spell where it is beautiful to get lost. The second record? Café de La Paix. We are in 1993 one of the highest examples of world music in Italy. A reassuring record. Third album Ten Stratagems of 2004, where Battiato seems to want to reflect on the past and on the approach of old age, because as he teaches you have to cross the sea to deceive the sky.
The shadow of the light
I have yielded to the desires that the sea has forbidden me to meet
The mind is something amazing, a treasure, desire-satisfying, a treasure chest, of every possible thing
Battiato has a curious and cultured audience. He accustomed him to open-mindedness not only through different music but also through the story of cultures and anecdotes different from the mass culture. I am thinking, for example, of his relations with the Arabic language e to its influences on the Sicilian language. An example? The text of Aurora, passage contained in open Sesame, was written by the Arab-Sicilian poet Ibn Hamdis. One way, Franco Battiato tells us in an interview, to remember how much we owe to the Arab world. How Italian culture is not only of Greek-Latin matrix. Curiosities that then remain in the pop culture of his listeners. I can't wait to listen to his new album and see it live again, to be kidnapped by again one of the few true Italian intellectuals.
