Autunna Et Sa Rose - Italian Neoclassicism Between Theatre and Music

Here is the human anguish in which the spectator must find himself upon leaving our theatre. He will be shaken and overwhelmed by the inner dynamism of the spectacle unfolding before his eyes. And this dynamism will be in direct relation to the anguish and concerns of his entire life. Such is the fatality we evoke, and the spectacle will be this very fatality.

(Antonin Artaud)

Born from the mind of multi-instrumentalist Saverio Tesolato, the ensemble Autunna Et Sa Rose is one of the most original projects to emerge from Italy's intricate experimental music scene. The band's ambitions go beyond those of a mere musical project, reaching toward the boundaries of a total art form that Tesolato calls teatro-musica, underlining the group's strong visionary, expressionist bent, combined with the ambition to range across as broad an artistic field as possible, one that overcomes the usual boundaries dividing the various forms of expression (theatre, visual arts, music).

While there are inevitable differences between the various LPs they've released, Autunna Et Sa Rose stand out for an unbridled passion for 20th-century avant-garde and for neoclassical ambitions with vague gothic overtones, which bring them close to the cultured new wave of Tuxedomoon or to the Rock In Opposition of Univers Zero. Theatre is a constant presence, particularly through the vision of absolute art held by French playwright Antonin Artaud, to whom virtually their entire discography is dedicated. But their strongest bond is with neo-chamber music, which looks both to the past and to the contemporary side of gothic music, and which counts among its guiding spirits that mystical-atmospheric strand tied to ancient folk traditions (see Dead Can Dance). Many have contributed to realizing such an ambitious project; among them, worth highlighting is the constant presence of opera singers Sonia Visentin (soprano) and Matilde Secchi (mezzo-soprano), two extraordinary voices in service of Tesolato's compositions.

My main source of inspiration was Antonin Artaud. His Dionysian approach to theatre, together with that sense of sacrifice consisting in wanting to give one's own life to art, was an essential source of inspiration for me. Besides this, Wim Wenders was important too; his "Wings of Desire" changed a good part of my life.

(Saverio Tesolato)

In 1996 they debuted with Sous La Robe Bleue, blending classical piano with theatrical lyrics and a voice that shifts between spoken word and operatic singing, with formidable interplay of piano and strings. After a Tuxedomoon-style opening on "L'Art Et La Mort" — a piece born as music for Artaud's text of the same name, with hypnotic synth beds and French spoken word — the record moves to piano worthy of a classical sonata on "La nascita di Selene". In "Caresses Aux Coeurs" all trace of darkness dissolves, giving way to fairy-tale worlds with crystalline voice and piano. What emerges as a complex concept about various female figures continues with the syncopated "La morte di Virginia". The peak is reached in the almost religious mysticism of "Slow Rain (Il prato dei sogni finiti)", worthy of Popol Vuh's "Hosianna Mantra", abruptly interrupted by a brief minimalist piano loop. The solo piano of "D.D." closes an album that is only the beginning of a discography well worth discovering.

It takes four years to reach the second album, but the wait pays off. Né L'être… Eternel (2000) is a work even more closely tied to classical music. Split into two parts, it moves from piano sonatas to Mahlerian arias, from surreal lyrics inspired by Artaud to the bare music-theatre of Igor Stravinsky's Russian period. Wind instruments and strings overlap with an elegance that clearly recalls symphonic music, with hints that even verge on the cinematic. The first part consists of four pieces for voice/cello/piano trio, but it's above all the voice and piano that dominate. A hugely inspired classical piano spanning the 19th and 20th centuries ("Stimmung", "Son Nom Est Douce") and a remarkable voice, especially in the two minutes of "Rose Jaune De Novembre".

The second part, far longer and more ambitious, attempts to recreate — using, alongside some acoustic instruments, a sophisticated sampling setup — the sound of a late-Romantic orchestra. It's a complex dark symphony on death, alternating minimal moments with grander ones, opening with "La coltre dell'ombra", ethereal and airy like a pastoral symphony, with winds, electronics and strings stretching out for eleven minutes up to a finale of religious chant. "La pioggia infinita", restless and experimental like early-20th-century classical music, serves as the soundtrack to a text paying homage to the work of Friedrich Hundertwasser, alternating unsettling static moments with sudden bursts of light.

"Con lentezza" opens onto fantastical worlds thanks to the sound of the flute, before continuing amid enchanted voices and untouched nature. "Memorie" stretches out even further, taking on the quality of a religious requiem. If memories are the place death will lead us to, perhaps there's nothing to fear. Overall, a work of great ambition, though Autunna Et Sa Rose's career had yet to reach its peak.

That peak comes closer in 2002 with Sturm, an extremely ambitious work of music-theatre spanning operatic singing and classical piano sonatas to dark dark-cabaret theatrical pieces in French and German that catapult us into expressionist theatre and decadent 1930s atmospheres. The album, featuring a giant of avant-garde new wave — Steven Brown of Tuxedomoon — as well as Gianluca Lo Presti (already known for the project "Nevica su Quattropuntozero") on guitars, is so far their most varied and longest work (65 minutes), as well as the one most centred on theatricality. The work tells the story of its protagonist Sturm (German for "storm"), a young Romantic, son of the 19th-century tradition, crushed by the blind militarist fury of the 20th century. It's a story of detachment from one's own time, of otherness and marginalisation, opening with the splendid "Overture", featuring a magnificent female vocal, and continuing with chamber music ("Das Unheimliche"), 19th-century piano ("Some Guys") and various moments of avant-garde theatre ("Vlak K Smrti"), right up to gothic cabaret ("Der beklemmende Atemzug, der mich im Traum plötzlich übergefallen hat").

Sturm, despite being marginalised by his contemporaries, finds a bond with the world through art and his love for Lybra. When the inevitable separation comes, he goes through a phase of psychosis in which the boundary between reality and dream grows ever thinner. This journey reaches its culmination in the extreme final ten minutes of "Spirales Cosmiques", an artistic summa in which Tesolato alternates psychotic whirlwinds of pure research with a reconciliatory finale of celesta and glockenspiel notes following one another like a children's game, restoring Sturm's sanity and finally allowing him to reach a lasting balance with nature and the cosmos.

In 2005 Tesolato collaborated with the historic Italian darkwave band Ataraxia, and this collaboration produced Odos Eis Ouranon (The Way to Heaven). The project, conceived two years earlier, is split into two sections — the two CDs titled respectively "Strange Lights" and "Logos" — corresponding to the two performances. Still tied to the works of Artaud, the new LP continues the music-theatre project, but places even greater emphasis on Tesolato's pianistic qualities. Eleven tracks resulting from a 2003 live performance in a church in Rovigo, where the dark atmospheres of Univers Zero meet the monologues and gestures of a theatrical work. The music becomes the acoustic frame for an abstract world, where only poetry and intellect reign. The way to heaven is the way to peace (in this case dedicated to Tesolato's grandfather, who had passed away a few months before the concert), where singing becomes angelic ("Caresses Aux Cœurs") and where 20th-century classical music is everywhere.

This acoustic, minimal version of the Autunna Et Sa Rose project opens a new horizon for the band's neoclassical theatricality.

Their ongoing journey into theatrical form continues in 2006 with L'Art Et La Mort, a partial turning point in their discography where the theatrical element becomes dominant. Here we find what appears to be a collection of wave-gothic/industrial tracks so heavily reworked — or we might say "theatricalised" — as to be practically unrecognisable even to genre devotees. More than simply "revised and corrected", they've been utterly overturned and turned inside out like socks, deconstructed, to take on a new life. This deconstruction becomes an added feature of the neoclassicism, even bringing it, in an ironic way, close to the cabaret of the Residents, particularly in the second half of the album, where mockery and electronics combine in a decidedly bizarre mix, as if Tesolato had thrown all his literary, theatrical and musical passions from the most varied eras into one great cauldron, producing an unrecognisable blend that can't help but contain its share of "weird" elements.

The cadaverised tracks by Tuxedomoon ("Kyfi"), Virgin Prunes ("Quand Nous Reverrons-nous?"), Coil ("Ostia"), Einstürzende Neubauten ("Ewig-Dunkel"), Dead Can Dance ("N'importe Où Hors Du Monde"), Bauhaus ("Et je me souviens aussi de") and Laubach ("Neue Wirklichkeit"), together with massive doses of neoclassical minimalism, Antonin Artaud's theatre and Charles Baudelaire's poetry, show no small measure of courage and ambition. Amid so much deconstructive chaos, the album closes with an untitled piece for solo piano, heir to the 20th-century pianistic tradition, another gem from Tesolato.

The music of Autunna Et Sa Rose finds no way to simplify itself — if anything, with Phalène D'onyx (2012), a concept album about love for humanity and nature thrown into crisis by modern consumerist society, there's a further step towards an abstract complexity that is particularly difficult to penetrate. In some ways it marks the culmination of a journey begun in 1996, where the fusion between visual arts and music is total, almost as if they were coming together to form an indistinguishable unicum. The music grows ever more stripped-down, with cello and piano clearly predominant, almost as if playing out a role on a theatre stage; it's no coincidence that the album features a collaboration with actor Sergio Scarlatella of Societas Raffaele Sanzio. It's an avant-garde experiment that displays their usual courage, with references to the Divine Comedy ("Sinfonia eterea e quieta"), building obsessive rhythms ("Seele Im Spielkartenschloss"), and tempos and verses that alternate with great complexity.

In 2017 Tesolato returns with Entrelacs Du Rêve, a strong candidate for their most accomplished work, the pinnacle of their passion for 20th-century avant-garde and a renewed communicative and emotional charge. A restless, dark dreamlike journey that uses classical instruments, with no rock instrumentation whatsoever aside from a sparing use of electronics that acts as a hidden binding agent rather than a lead voice. Into this dark journey through 20th-century avant-garde, ranging from twelve-tone composition to French musique concrète to the pianism of Lennie Tristano, soprano Sonia Visentin and mezzo-soprano Matilde Secchi are added, in a sonic kaleidoscope of constant dialogue between piano and cello, improvisations and female vocals to be listened to again and again to uncover ever new small details. It's also a project to be read, since Tesolato, in the same year, published the book "Intrecci di sogno", the prose counterpart to the album.

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