Gabriella Ferri

Gabriella Ferri was not merely the brilliant interpreter of Roman – and later Neapolitan – song that most people remember today, but a hungry, creative mind capable of absorbing the influences of many cultures. In 1969 one of her songs, translated into Spanish as “Te regalo yo mis ojos”, became a huge hit in Latin America, prompting her to perform a series of concerts across the continent. During her time there, Gabriella grew close to local folk song, and for years she nurtured that passion privately.

Years later, on September 11, 1973, General Augusto Pinochet seized power in Chile and silenced every cultural expression in the country. Five days later, singer-songwriter Víctor Jara was murdered, along with many other dissidents. Inti Illimani, one of the most celebrated collectives of that scene, took refuge in Italy, where they found a period of considerable popularity.

In this renewed public interest in the affairs of Latin America, Gabriella probably finds the conviction to tackle the traditional repertoire of those lands, and decides to devote the first side of her new album, "Remedios", to it.

Compared to the Italian repertoire, which she tackles with violence and shamelessness, the singer shows herself protective towards the Latin classics, reserving particularly delicate interpretations for them.

"La paloma", a habanera composed by Spanish author Sebastián Iradier in 1860 during his stay in Cuba, is easily one of the finest among the hundreds of existing versions, with the subdued sound of the harmonica providing counterpoint in the chorus and a sweeping orchestral bed in the finale.

"Cielito lindo", a mariachi-band standard written in 1882 by Quirino Mendoza y Cortés, leans carefully into its original romantic context, while the other Mexican classic, "La cucaracha", takes on a far harsher meaning, with the strictly chosen lyrics drawn from the revolutionary period (1910-1917).

"La cucaracha, la cucaracha, ya no puede caminar, porque no tiene, porque le falta, marihuana que fumar": the reference is to Victoriano Huerta, the Mexican tyrant with well-known drug and alcohol problems, one of the most hated figures in the country's history. Despite its overexposure and the trivial uses it's often put to, "La cucaracha" remains one of the songs that best symbolized a people's rebellion. Gabriella shows herself fully aware of the historical weight of what she's handling, delivering an interpretation of crystalline formal perfection, helped along by the superb arrangement from brothers Guido and Maurizio De Angelis (mariachi horns, percussion, driving piano dynamics).

"La malagueña" is a surprise, a song made famous after the war by giants of Mexican music such as Miguel Aceves Mejía and Trío Los Panchos. Marked in those versions by endless high notes, here it's pitched several tones lower and set within an intimate vision for solo guitar.

With "Grazie alla vita" Gabriella lays her cards on the table, translating into Italian the anthem by Violeta Parra, legendary figure of Chilean music, who died by suicide in 1967 after long suffering from depression: although she didn't live to see the Pinochet regime, Parra is regarded as the founder of the nueva canción chilena, whose later exponents would confront the dictator in person, paying dearly for their courage. For this reason Parra is still seen today as a symbol of hope by the Chilean people, and for this reason tackling her most famous song at that precise historical moment carries a powerful symbolic charge. It's clear in Gabriella's voice that she is deeply convinced she has entered into symbiosis with the song, as if in a kind of spiritual connection with its author, whose illness she would later come to share.

The masterpiece of the first side - and one of the high points of Italian music - is however the title track, written and composed by Ferri, recorded directly in Spanish, as if it were a song of popular origin. The mimicry is perfect: an unrepeatable balance of poetry, melancholy melody and tasteful arrangement, with the warm, full sound of the bass up front. It's essential to include the translation: "Remedios, little dear one, young girl, beautiful, sweet, gorgeous little thing, left there, sitting by the sea, your hands full of pearls, the sun on your brow and the smile, white orchid, soul and dove, and the joy, you sing consolation, you sing hope, you sing Remedios. Your story was told to us once by God, your little brother with his guitar, you had fallen asleep beneath the moon, you were happy, little Remedios".

The second side returns to its Roman roots, with no drop in quality: "Semo in centoventitré", with its boisterous paraponzipò over an almost ska beat, brings back the irreverent performer of previous albums; "E dormi pupo dorce" is a lullaby of infinite tenderness that moves at the pace of a music box, with plucked strings; "Nina si voi dormite", a Roman classic from 1901 already tackled a few years earlier, shows off a gentle arrangement for guitar and keyboards.

Then there's "Canto de malavita", which without this recording would probably have been lost forever: a lyric with very little circulation, anonymous author, telling a prison story with a tone of disillusioned resignation. Gabriella pairs it with a melody of her own composition, and when in the chorus she cries out in despair "E mo' sto dentro, come te posso ama'?", in that moment you sense that, in all likelihood, no postwar voice ever understood Rome as well as hers.

The album reaches number three on the charts, closing out in triumphant fashion the artist's peak period of popularity. The following year, her father's death shatters her fragile inner balance, and from then on the road grows ever more tortuous, until her untimely death on April 3, 2004.

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22/06/2014