Mimmo Locasciulli

Mimmo Locasciulli is an Italian singer-songwriter, born in Penne, Abruzzo, in 1949.

At the end of the Sixties, after experiences with beat and rock groups, he gravitated toward folk and folk-rock music thanks to his encounters with European and American musicians he met in Perugia, home to a prestigious university for foreign students, where he was studying Medicine.

In 1971 he moved to Rome and joined the roster of Folkstudio, the venue where Antonello Venditti and Francesco De Gregori also took their first steps.

In 1975, his first album ("Non rimanere là") was released on the "Folkstudio" label, and over the following years it was followed by 14 more LPs, including "Quattro canzoni di M.L.", "Intorno a trent'anni" and "Sognadoro", all produced by De Gregori.

From 1981 to 1983 Locasciulli worked closely with Francesco De Gregori, taking part as pianist and guest artist in the famous 1981 "Tournée del pulmino" and the subsequent Titanic tour, and contributing piano and keyboards to the albums "Titanic" and "La donna cannone".

In 1985 he took part in the Sanremo Festival, in the "Campioni" category, with the song "Buona Fortuna". That same summer, during his summer tour, he recorded a live album featuring guest singer-songwriter Enrico Ruggeri. For the occasion the two wrote, sang and recorded together the song "Confusi in un playback", which gave its title both to the album and to the successful theatrical tour the two artists embarked on in late '85.

In 1987 he opened for Tom Waits on the occasion of the Premio Tenco awarded to the Californian singer-songwriter, performing with Ruggeri the Italian version of "Foreign Affair". This sparked a friendship and working relationship with Greg Cohen, Tom Waits's musical director and bassist, a collaboration that continues to this day and has resulted in four Locasciulli albums ("Adesso glielo dico", "Tango dietro l'angolo", "Delitti perfetti" and "Uomini"), recorded in Italy and the United States with Italian and American musicians (including Marc Ribot, The Uptown Horns, Lenny Pickett, Michael Blair, Charlie Giordano, Willie Schwarz and others), as well as eight tours across Italy and Europe (Austria, Germany, Switzerland, France) between 1989 and 1995.

In 1992 he composed the music for the play "Jack lo sventratore" by Vittorio Franceschi, premiered at the Festival dei Due Mondi in Spoleto.

In 1994 he composed the entire soundtrack for Enzo Monteleone's film "La vera vita di Antonio H.", starring Alessandro Haber, which screened and won an award at the Venice Film Festival that same year.

"Uomini", an album in which Locasciulli returns to his early folk-rock sound and which includes, among other tracks, "Il suono delle campane" — written and sung with De Gregori — was released in May 1995.

Exactly three years after "Uomini" came "Il Futuro", a covers album paying tribute to the greatest contemporary rock songwriters, from Bob Dylan to Tom Waits, from Leonard Cohen to Randy Newman, from Elvis Costello to David Byrne and others. On this album too, Locasciulli and De Gregori (hiding behind the pseudonym Cereno Diotallevi) sing a duet, and for the occasion they chose the gorgeous "Powderfinger" by Neil Young.

Alongside his work as a singer-songwriter, Locasciulli has also worked as a producer: Stefano Delacroix ("Ribelli", "La legge non vale"), Goran Kuzminac ("Fragole e pugnali"), Claudio Lolli ("Viaggio in Italy") and Alessandro Haber ("Haberrante", "Qualcosa da dichiarare") are his most recent productions, released (distributed by Sony Music) on his own label, Hobo.

In June 2002 his fourteenth album, "Aria di famiglia", was released — a double CD featuring 20 of Locasciulli's finest compositions (all with reworked arrangements), plus four previously unreleased tracks and the soundtrack to the film "La vera vita di Antonio H". The album features guests such as Enrico Ruggeri (with whom Mimmo wrote the song "Aria di famiglia" and alongside whom he revisits "Confusi in un Playback"), Paola Turci, with whom he sings "Il suono delle campane", Andrea Mirò, with whom he duets on "Due amiche", Paolo Fresu on trumpet and flugelhorn on "Ballando" and "Una vita che scappa", Greg Cohen (double bass) and Francesco De Gregori on acoustic guitar.

In July 2003, a CD single was released for the German-speaking market, born out of the friendship and collaboration with Büne Huber, frontman of a rock band very popular in Switzerland and Germany (Patent Ochsner): on it Locasciulli sings the Italian version of a beautiful song by Büne ("Hotelsong") together with its author, while Huber performs a German version of one of Mimmo's most poignant songs, "Natalina".

In January 2004 Locasciulli released his 15th album, "Piano piano", an entirely acoustic record once again featuring the great bassist Greg Cohen. The album also includes "Hotelsong" (with Büne Huber), a tribute to Piero Ciampi ("Tu no") and "Olio sull'acqua", co-written with Enrico Ruggeri and Francesco De Gregori.

In May 2006 his 16th album, "Sglobal", was released, produced by Greg Cohen and Locasciulli himself, recorded between Rome and New York with the participation of several major guest artists: Frankie Hi-Nrg, with whom Mimmo wrote and sang the title track, Alex Britti on electric guitar on "Aiuto!", Stefano Di Battista on sax on "Perso e trovato" and "Sglobal", and the extraordinary American guitarist Marc Ribot, featured on several tracks.

In early 2007 Locasciulli took part in an initiative organized by the city of Turin, named alongside Rome as the world's book capital, setting to music a selection of Leonard Cohen poems that he himself had translated. The concert, first staged in Turin, was repeated in Cairo as part of the International Book Fair, at which Italy was guest of honor.

The emotions gathered on this journey, amplified by the influence of Cohen's poetry, form the starting point for Locasciulli's new compositions.

The circle closes in June 2008 when Locasciulli takes part, alongside Lucio Dalla and Luca Carboni, in a concert on the island of Lampedusa, for a ceremony dedicated to migrant peoples. Two months later the songs are written, and in May 2009 Mimmo's 17th album, “Idra”, sees the light of day (released a few months earlier in Switzerland), which the artist himself considers his most important, profound and painstaking work. “Idra” was produced by Cohen, Locasciulli and his son Matteo, once again at Dubway Studios in New York, and completed at Studio Hobo Recording, just outside Rome. The album is enriched by the participation of two exceptional American musicians with whom Greg regularly collaborates: Marc Ribot, regarded as the most brilliant and innovative guitarist of the last twenty years, and Joey Baron, a top-tier figure among living drummers. The album also features two great Italian jazz musicians, hugely popular the world over: Stefano di Battista on sax and Gabriele Mirabassi on clarinet.

In 2023 Sony announced the reissue on vinyl of the album “Sognadoro”, in a limited edition.

(From the official website)