Franca Masu
Aquamare

"The sea has voices. And Franca Masu is a very special one. They are scents, colors, sea salt...." ILUIS ILACH

"Franca Masu's voice has its roots in the monody of the matriarchal Sardinian song as it was in the past for Maria Carta and as it is today for Elena Ledda. A voice that speaks of sun, sea, people..." PAOLO FRESU

"AQUAMARE" is the taste and regret of existence, the desire of the wave, the tear of time.." CARLES DUARTE

Hello guys, I introduce you to Franca Masu, from Sardinia and on her third album... The first two made her a character in Lisboa and Barcelona and almost unknown to us.. Does anyone remember the story of Gianmaria Testa, a singer-songwriter from Cuneo, charting in France and unknown here? These things happen in our country... This is the first album that Franca presents properly in Italy and it's titled "AQUAMARE". A singer from Alghero and the Catalan voice of Sardinia.

Her melting-pot is closer to her Spanish neighbors than to Rome and Italy. You know how it breaks and writes?' So, Masu sings; Catalan, seafaring, and harbor-bound.... assembling in herself, in an enticing mix, unrequited Neapolitan loves, the aphrodisiac impulses of flamenco, the "spleen" and the "Saudade" of fado, and the erotic quality of Argentine tango and more... Twelve original tracks, with the only exceptions being "Cancò per a tu" (by Endrigo-Bardotti-Bacalov) and "Alfonsina y el mar" (by Ariel-Ramirez already in Mercedes Sosa's repertoire). As I said, Franca is better known in Barcelona and Lisbon than here with us. What a job, guys! But there's always time to catch up! I rely on you!! The picture that stands out on the cover shows us an intelligent face and eyes as deep as the sea she has always gazed at and been inspired by from the sixteenth-century walls of Alghero founded by the Genoese Doria, but under Catalan-Aragonese dominion.. And for Franca, it's quite natural to sing in Catalan to the point of interpreting Endrigo (very Italian) in her primary language..

I recall a story involving Tabucchi, a high-level professor and writer... He fell so deeply in love with Pessoa that he learned Portuguese and wrote a story in the Lusitanian language about Fernando's last days. The book appeared with us curated by an Italian translator and not by Trabucchi himself!!!!! What a spectacle!!! Art and love for.. lead far away and cause such tricks!!!! Franca Masu is the daughter of a famous 20th-century Sardinian painter, Manlio... She dedicates the first track to him: "DENTRO LE TELE DIPINTE DI LUCE UNA NUVOLA AZZURRA, VELE AL VENTO... SEI TU FRAGILE BATTITO DEL CUORE, NELLA NOTTE DUE ALI AZZURRE". Naturally, it is translated from Catalan in which she sings.. "NUVOL BLAU" is the title of this first track... "IL TEMPO SI DISSOLVE NON CONTA Più NIENTE PER NOI IL TEMPO SI DISSOLVE IN UNA GOCCIA NASCE LA VITA TU SEI LA MADRE DELL'ACQUA" "Sa Mama 'e s'abba" is the second track, followed by the Catalanized Endrigo's song... Do you know: "the party has just begun... and it's already over?" which here turns into: "La festa a penes comencada, ja s'ha acabat".. "QUERIDO CIELO" is track number four "VIVO EN MI SUENO EN SOLEDAD SIENTO ILOLAR EL VIENTO DEL MAR ENTRE LAS CALLES; ENTRE LA GENTE DONDE TU ESTAS AUSENTE QUERIDO CIELO CUIDAME, CUIDAME" This fourth track I won't translate. Come on, it's not difficult! You can understand, right? If you nurture and cultivate poetry within you, it won't be difficult!!! Followed by "TRIA LA VIDA": "E IL MIO SILENZIO RESTAVA CHIUSO DENTRO AI MIE OCCHI"...

More "poiesis" with "PRESENCIES": "SE LA NOSTALGIA è UNA DISTANZA PARLO ALLE MIEI GIOVANI ONDE DEL MIO AMORE FRAGILE".... In the deeply maritime "CARES" Franca sings praises of her native land... "LA JOIA DE ALGHER ENTRE DE LES NOSTRES MANS DINS DE LA VOLUNTAT HI ESTà EL SECRET DEL NOSTRE GRAND AMOR"... Lapalissian!!! The eighth "Quedar-me sola" is poignant like the "l'accordiòn" by Franco Beccalossi that introduces it: "LE LUCI SONO SPENTE E NEL SILENZIO GUARDANDO NELLO SPECCHIO MI CHIEDEVO "CHE VOCE AVRò STASERA, SE SONO COSì TRISTE?"... And it is the turn of "MIRANT ESTRELLES"; beautiful acoustic 12-string guitar and a voice that brings out previously silent, dormant, intuitive extensions "in nuce" until now.... Hints of electronic tenors give evident post-modern hints of the traditional local singing: "TERRES; TERRES DE MAR DE LA MEDITERRANIA DE MES IMMENSITAT" for an unleashed and uncontrollable vocalization in the style of "Noa", a vocalist from the land of Israel.... And finally, it is time for a song in Italian: incredible, but true!!! "Aquamare" that gives the album its title... Franca here moves into a Dangerous territory in the sense of the "Tigress of Cremona"..., Good God!!! she evokes and recalls her a lot... and she seems like "THE LYNX OF ALGHERO" feline, sinuous and vocally quite extensive.

In "ALFONSINA Y EL MARE" poetry touches geometric heights: "PER LA SOFFICE SABBIA LAMBITA DAL MARE LA SUA PICCOLA ORMA NON TORNA MAI E UN SENTIERO SOLITARIO DI PENA E SILENZIO é GIUNTO SINO ALL'ACQUA PROFONDA E UN SENTIERO SOLITARIO DI DURA PENA è GIUNTO SINO ALLA SPUMA"... Dedicated to the Argentine poetess ALFONSINA STORNI by Ariel Ramirez and Feliz Luna is, as I mentioned earlier, part of Mercedes Sosa's repertoire... But how many Sosas are encountered these days up there at Debaser??? It closes once again with the sea in the twelfth track in Italian: "MARE APERTO". How strange!! When Franca sings with Latin rhythms she seems, in a broad sense, like the Mina mentioned above... and when instead she warbles in Catalan she reminds me of a "Dulce Pontes" in becoming. What a voice guys, and what poetry!!! Do you want to give up this pearl of Alghero that the recording market will never offer you?? Rainer, the protector of "outsiders" and vocal beauty, thinks about it, not to mention. With Franca Masu, one goes to the roots of human passions....

This is not a record with grooves? Perhaps a sailboat that drags the sea and its waves to produce pearly, melancholic and sad glimmers, but that know of real life, of nets, of fishing, and of existential questioning. Do you want to miss this map of seas rendered in song? This raw and wild poetry? This sun-drenched and stunning enchantment? This is a cruise in Catalonia, starting from the intricate alleys of old Alghero, with a stop in Naples and the ports of Europe... up to touching the edge of the "FINIS TERRAE"? Do as you please!! Franca Masu's "Aquamare" is a must!!! It is a lyrical and classical aedic voice in the Greek sense. "MILA; A RESONANCE IN THE VOICE/ YOU HAVE; THAT COMFORTS AND SADDENS ME/ LIKE IN OCTOBER WHEN WITH THE MANDARS/ ONE WALKS ALONG THE SEA" D'Annunzio, The Daughter of Iorio. Woe to those who evade this invitation!!

Bye! smiles of unknown distances! your Rainer!!

Ps... an applause to: Marcello Peghin - Guitars Fausto Beccalossi - accordion Mauro Palmas - mandoloncello, contromandola Salvatore Maltana - double bass, acoustic bass Gavino Murgia - sax and winds Andrea Ruggeri - drums Marco Malatesta - percussion Andrea Ubach - darbouka, cajon, colors Maurizio Delrio - flamenco guitar Giovanni Sanna Passino - trumpet Karel Quartet - strings

I wrote this piece with the assistance of a "Aragosta" White Vermentino from Sardinia 2006. Cantina SANTA MARIA LA PALMA (ALGHERO)... Just to be in sync!!! Voilà!!!! 12 degrees like the divine tracks of Franca Masu's album