Franco Battiato

Franco Battiato (Ionia, March 23, 1945 - Milo, May 18, 2021) was an Italian singer-songwriter, musician and film director.

One of the most eclectic and original personalities to have appeared on the Italian cultural scene in recent decades, he went through multiple musical styles: romantic beginnings, progressive rock in the 1970s, philosophical pop, music cultured or ethnic music.

Artistic career

Close to his mother Grazia (who died in 1994), he was a tenacious self-taught. In the mornings he studied as a bachelor, he worked part time in a cafe and in the afternoons he was a teacher, the only profession available in his place of origin. At the age of eighteen and after the death of his father, he moved to Milan, the center of the Italian music industry, where he would start as a kitchen help, mail delivery man and bookseller to support his musical pursuits and help his family, made up of his mother., cousin and aunts, dedicated to the trade of tailoring and teaching first letters. For a few years he was a guitarist and pianist in restaurants, organist in religious ceremonies, radio and television programs. His first salaries were invested in recording limited edition discs that he distributed to radio stations. In 1965 he appeared at the Sanremo Festival with the song "L' amore é partito" (Love has departed).

By 1968, he obtained his first musical contract with Philips and began singing covers of pop songs. Around that time he recorded the romantic song "È l'amore", with which he achieved some recognition. In the 1970s, during military service, he met the experimental musician Juri Camisasca, and collaborated with him in the group "Osage Tribe", an Italian psychedelic and progressive rock band. At the same time, as a soloist, he released the single La Convenzione / Paranoia (1971), and delves into his experimentation with electronic music, producing a series of LPs that at the time went unnoticed, but which are now considered cult records by critics and listeners.

In the beginning, Battiato recorded progressive rock material with an emphasis on the synthesizer and the games of his own voice, and in a gradual process he made his music more conceptual and minimalist. His first LP, Fetus (1971), considered by many to be the best progressive rock album of the 70s in Europe. The album was censored then for dealing with issues such as abortion, extramarital affairs and social hypocrisy that trades in misfortune, it also contained the explicit image of a few-month-old fetus on its cover. A year later he presents the LP Pollution (1972), which also caused controversy for including a song written from the perspective of a fish. He also referred to the body, to man's irresponsibility towards nature and the exploitation of the individual by industries. A short time later the LPs Sulle corde di Aries (1973), Clic (1974), M.elle "Le Gladiator" (1975) and also that same year the compilation album Feed back. In 1975 he changed record company to Dischi Ricordi. With this new contract he released the LPs Battiato (1975), Juke Box (1976), and L'Egitto prima delle sabbie (1977). With this record, Franco Battiato won the "Stockhausen Award" as "Best Contemporary Music". In 1977, he left the Ricordi record company on good terms, and signed with EMI. From that moment he approaches the pop genre, which gave him great popularity with the Italian audience. During this period, his albums were worked on in collaboration with renowned musicians such as the virtuoso violinist Giusto Pio.

In 1979, he released the album L'era del cinghiale bianco. In 1980 he presented the album Patriots, and in 1981 the album La voce del padrone, which achieved great success in his country, becoming the first Italian LP to sell more than a million copies in a month. A year later he released the album L & # 39; arca di Noè , where songs like & # 34; Voglio vederti danzare & # 34; ("I want to see you dance"), among others. With this record, Battiato gained a reputation as one of the most versatile and intelligent musicians in Italy. Many of his songs from that time contained parts in English and Arabic (a language that Battiato began to study on one of his trips to Turkey). Some Battiato records were also published entirely in Spanish and English.

In 1983, he returned to his studies and Orizzonti perduti appeared. In 1984 he represented his country at the Eurovision Song Contest in Luxembourg with "I treni di Tozeur", forming a duo with Alice and obtaining fifth place. Later, in 1985, he released the renowned albums Mondi lontanissimi and Echoes of Sufi dances, from which the songs for singles, "La estación de los amores" / "The Trains of Tozeur", "Via Lattea", "New Feeling" and "No time no space". Two years later, the album Nómadas was released. In 1988 she presented Fisiognomica (with which she sold more than 300,000 copies) and in 1989 she released the live album Giubbe rosse which contains & # 34; L' ocean of silence" which features lyrics by Fleur Jaeggy. In Spain, the album was released in 1990 with several songs sung in Spanish recorded at his concert at the Alcalá Palace Theater in Madrid.On the other hand, from 1987, Battiato also dedicated himself to producing classical operas. Such is the case of Genesi (1987), Gilgamesh (1992), Messa archaica (1994) and Il Cavaliere dell' intellect. The latter was the only one of the 4 that was not published on CD.

Franco Battiato began the decade of the 90s composing the music for the film Benvenuto Cellini and with the production of the album Come un camel in a grindaia (1991). In Spain, a Spanish version was published with the title Like a camel in a gutter. Two years later the album Caffè de la Paix appeared and in 1994 it went on sale a live album titled Unprotected. In 1990, he started another experimentation, this time in the area of painting, under the pseudonym "Süphan Barzani". From that year 1994 he works together with the Sicilian philosopher Manlio Sgalambro, with whom he wrote many of the lyrics of the subsequent albums.

Battiato liked the quiet life on the slopes of Etna. He cultivated close friendships with religious ministers of different faiths, with philosophers and scholars such as Umberto Eco, Raimon Panikkar and mainly with Manlio Sgalambro. This is how Sgalambro appears on the album L'ombrello e la macchina da cucire in 1995 and in 1996 they publish their best collaborative work: L'imboscata. On this album is the hit "La cura" ("El cuidado"), chosen that year as the "Best Italian Song of the Year".

Also that same year, a double compilation album titled Battiato studio collection was released. In 1997 a double compilation album of their live performances titled Battiato live collection appears. In 1998 he recorded the album Gommalacca and closed the decade with the album Fleurs (1999). From 2000, the albums were released: Campi magnetici (2000), Ferro battuto (2001) - Battiato was a vegetarian, the song "Sarcofagia", included in the album Ferro Battuto (2001), is inspired by Plutarco's treatise Περὶ σαρκοφαγίας (Perí sarkofaguías, or in Latin De esu carnium; in Spanish it means "On the consumption of meat"-, Fleurs 3 (2002), the double live CD Last summer dance (2003), Dieci stratagemmi (2004) and Il vuoto (2007). ", of which he also produced the soundtrack. This film won the "Silver Ribbon" award for "Best New Director". Shortly after, he presented his second film production entitled Musikanten, which received a harsh criticism from specialists.

In Spain, Franco Battiato had a well-deserved reputation and his records sold very well. In May 1986, Franco Battiato performed at the Palacio de los Deportes in Madrid within the programming of the San Isidro Festival of that year. Some of the albums released in Spain, and not mentioned above, are: Battiato in Spanish (1987), the double Battiato collection: 29 songs in Spanish (1996), the compilation La estación de los amores (2005), containing a CD with 19 hits in Spanish plus a DVD with 25 video clips. As for the singles, it is also worth noting the titles: "Cuccurucucu" (1981), "Permanent center of gravity" (1982) (song that inspired "Venezia" by the Hombres G, as they have stated), "Bandera blanca" (1987), "Nomads" (1987), "And I come to look for you" (1988), "Letter to the Governor of Libya" (1990), "Poor homeland" (1991), "I want to see you dance" (new 1996 edition) and "Vida en diagonal" (2001). Battiato has performed multiple times in Spain from the mid-eighties to 2017 (the year he stopped going on stage), combining large concerts such as those in Barcelona, Bilbao, Madrid, Seville, Valencia or Zaragoza, with other small ones full of charm in places like Burgos, Cartagena ("la mar de músicas"), Corvera (Asturias), Lanuza (Huesca, "Pyrenees Sur") or Logroño, among others, showing care and attention to his public that very few artists have had.

Between November 2012 and March 2013, he was appointed Cultural Advisor for the Region of Sicily.

In recent years, Franco has published the albums: Fleurs 2 (2008), Inneres auge (2009), the opera Telesio (2011), Apriti sesamo (2012) which is his last solo LP with all the new songs and which was also released in Spanish (Open sesame), Joe Patti's experimental group (2014) and Le nostre anime (2015) with four completely new songs and several re-recorded versions of their most representative classics. In 2013, together with Antony, he published the magnificent album recorded live from the Verona Arena: Del suo veloce volo. Finally, in 2019 Torneremo ancora came out, the It would be his last album, because with this work he announced his definitive withdrawal from music.

Lay it on the doors of her house in Milo.

Battiato died on the morning of May 18, 2021 at his home in Praino di Milo, at the age of 76. For a long time, his family wanted to keep his state of health in the strictest confidence. The funeral was held the following day in a strictly private manner in the chapel of Villa Grazia, his home. The funeral was celebrated by two priests who are friends of Battiato: Father Guidalberto Bormolini, who lived closely the last years of Battiato, presided over the ceremony in Milo, collecting his thoughts and confidences since he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in November 2017, which together with a fall at home and the fracture of the femur and pelvis after a previous fall on stage during a concert, were decisive in the definitive march of the Sicilian artist; and Father Orazio Barbarino. Both were close to the singer-songwriter in the last months of his life; The latter told the press that the musician "had been struggling with a degenerative disease that forced him to speak very little" for some time. Initially, the artist's ashes would rest in his house in Milo, but later they were buried in the Riposto cemetery, in the family chapel.

Discography

Films about Franco Battiato

• Temporary Road. (one) Vita di Franco Battiato by Giuseppe Pollicelli and Mario Tani (Italy, 2013)

Honours and titles

•Gold Medal of Merit for Culture and Art (Rome, April 2, 2003)

•Officer of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (May 24, 2004)

•Honoris Causa Doctorate in Modern Philology from the University of Catania

Eponymy

• The asteroid of the main belt (18556) Battiato, discovered in 1997, received this name in his honor. Battiato was an honorary member of a Sicilian astronomical association, the Associazione Astrofili Ionico-Etnei. Through the telescope he watched the Universe, inspired for his songs.