Yesterday, Luca Barbarossa raised the curtain on the XXXIX edition of the Giuseppe Dessì Literary Prize in Villacidro , with the presentation in words and music of his latest book “ One hundred stories for one hundred songs ”, published a few months ago by the publishing house La nave di Teseo .
The Roman singer-songwriter, author and radio host spoke with Giacomo Casti , bringing to a large and attentive audience stories and anecdotes about songs and authors who have left a deep mark on his life and on the history of the twentieth century.
From the story of the composer Frank Churchill , who began his musical career as a teenager playing the piano in small provincial movie theaters and thanks to his talent became the composer that Walt Disney wanted to create the soundtracks of his most famous animated films, winning the Oscar in 1942 for the soundtrack of Dumbo. A worldwide success that was not enough to banish his pain of living and heal his sensitivity devastated by the horrors of the Second World War and the loss of two of his dearest friends, leading him that same year to take his own life next to the piano that he loved so much.
An evening open to “The songs I would ideally carry in my suitcase during a trip”, reveals Barbarossa, which range from light pieces that tell small fragments of customs and society to the stories of epochal songs such as “ Like a rolling stone ” by Bob Dylan , “A song that apparently speaks of the ephemeral beauty and the slide towards oblivion of a top model, but which in part tells the story of our Western society, its rolling, like a stone, towards an individualistic direction, the incongruities and hypocrisy of those who pretend not to see the difficulties and desperation of those who live beyond a wall, which can be physical like the one that divides Mexico from the United States, or metaphorical like the Mediterranean Sea”, says Barbarossa with the delicacy that distinguishes his narration and his writing.
From the story of Billie Holiday and " Strange Fruit " to Raffaella Carrà 's " Tuca Tuca ", from Mogol and Battisti to the Beatles , the evening was spent on the edge of " Emotions ", interspersed with some of the Roman singer-songwriter's best-known pieces played acoustically - including Roma nudata , Via Margutta , Passami er sale , Portami a danza - which involved the audience like a warm embrace inside the small Don Bosco theatre, a location that contributed to creating an intimate, almost familiar atmosphere.