Stefano Battaglia - piano,
prepared piano
Michael Gassmann - trumpet
Mirco Mariottini - clarinets
Dominique Pifarely - violin
Vincent Courtois - cello
Aya Shimura - cello
Salvatore Maiore - double-bass
Bruno Chevillon - double-bass
Roberto Dani - drums
Michele Rabbia - percussion
CD 1
1. CANZONE DI LAURA BETTI
2. TOTÒ E NINETTO
3. CANTO POPOLARE
4. COSA SONO LE NUVOLE
5. FEVRAR
6. IL SOGNO DI UNA COSA
7. TEOREMA
8. CALLAS
9. PIETRA LATA
CD 2
1. LYRA I
2. LYRA II
3. MEDITAZIONE ORALE
4. LYRA III
5. LYRA IV
6. SCRITTI CORSARI
7. LYRA V
8. EPIGRAMMI
9. LYRA VI
10. SETACCIO
11. LYRA VII
12. MIMESIS, DIVINA MIMESIS
13. LYRA VIII
14. OSTIA
15. PASOLINI
Stefano Battaglia has us
captured from the start, waving our lighters
in the air on the first track; a slow, richly
melodic waltz called Canzone di Laura Betti.
This is Stefano Battaglia’s
second album for ECM, and in it he honours
his countryman Pier Paolo Pasolini (1922-1975)
who was one of the great European filmmakers
and renaissance men of the 20th century; the
sheer scope of Pasolini’s work and eventful
life attracting and inspiring Battaglia to
create the project recorded here. Two different
line-ups are given music and themes which
make reference to the atmospheres of Pasolini’s
films, the actors in them, and to the man
himself.
The first CD features a group
that also tours with the name ‘Pietra Lata
Sestetto’. This disc has a lush, melodic emphasis
- melancholy, nostalgia and tenderness being
amongst the music’s principal emotional characteristics.
Battaglia certainly maintains an Italian tradition
in this aspect of his music making, and while
the tracks have an extended atmospheric feel
which can give a sense of static transience,
there is always a quality in the playing which
brings you back – making you listen more carefully,
giving you the feel that you’re missing something
a bit special if you just have the thing playing
in the background. A highlight for me is the
seriously spooky Teorema, which might
even be strong enough to save a remake of
‘The French Connection’, should anyone be
foolish enough to try.
The second CD has a freer,
more improvisatory feel, doing away with the
horns and adding Dominique Pifarély,
Bruno Chevillon and Vincent Courtois, all
names which may be familiar to ECM collectors.
Battaglia explores subjects including Pasolini’s
troubled relationship with the church, his
radical politics, and, on the bleak but moving
Ostia, his violent death in 1975. Battaglia
says of this particular track, "my piece
is intended as a Passion for Pasolini, a soundtrack
for the violent and mysterious tragedy which
occurred on that night of All Saints..."
Several of the pieces are short, sketch like,
and with a feel of spontaneous but deeply
felt expression. There are some almost Eric
Satie-like sonorities here and there in the
Lyra pieces (later almost Webernesque)
which are variations using different instrumentations.
The spirit of Keith Jarrett helps out in the
intense piano solo Scritti corsair,
and other Battaglia improvisations have a
dual rhapsodic-serial feel which always gives
you a good brain-massage. The prepared piano
appearing in Mimesis, divina mimesis is
coupled with bowed percussion to create a
doom-laden vision of Dante’s hell. The whole
thing ends with the truncated question mark
of Pasolini, which has a similar
effect to the unfinished fugue of J.S. Bach’s
BWV 1080.
ECM’s presentation of these recordings goes
beyond their sometimes overly enigmatic style,
including several Pasolini film stills which
reflect something of the nature of the music.
Battaglias’s own detailed booklet notes give
an account of the origins of each of the pieces,
outlining his programmatic intention and creative
impulses. This remarkable double CD won’t
have you dancing in the streets, but its cover
should carry an advisory warning: ‘the content
and message of this recording may affect the
way you see the world.’
Dominy Clements
CD Reviews
ECM 1716738 (1998/99)
