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Rating: It was the post-war period. The Italian post-war.
A great culture inflated and conditioned by another great culture. The first, ancient and almost decadent, invigorated by the end of a dictatorship and a war, the second, very young, aggressive. And above all, fun.
Jazz.
During the twenty years, little jazz was digested. The duce seemed to appreciate it, but he didn't let his people listen to it much. Too much freedom, too much imagination, evidently. But then, a sign that perhaps some notes were whispered within the dictatorial walls, Benito the jazzman found it at home.
After the twenty years, the explosion. And it seems to see these slender young people with bright eyes, with "vinyl records" under their arms, listening together to beautiful things from overseas, dreaming with open mouths, and immediately imitating.
Among them the man with the blown tenor sax. Gianni Basso from Piedmont. Who has now decided to leave to play in higher orchestras, perhaps beside his idols. Next to the Duke, in section with Coleman or with Lester, his main idols and models.
Like all historical Italian jazz musicians, he had small flaws and great strengths.
The only real flaw is, and it is also in this beautiful record, a phrasing that too evidently betrays the saxophonic profile of the Masters.
Surely as a young man, the Piedmontese Gianni chewed Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young from breakfast to dinner, drawing great benefits from it, infinite inspiration, and knowing how to mix it all with an undeniable personal sensitivity.
In this record, the one with which I like to remember him (along with some historic records with Valdambrini, well republished for enthusiasts), he is in duo with another giant of the Italian jazz scene of then and now: Renato Sellani, a man and pianist of absolute elegance.
The phrasing of both recalls the golden age of jazz, but with a melodic/harmonic attention that is entirely our own: their way of playing is sweet, refined, cultured, and capable. It has a magnificent prerogative, the bright and increasingly rare side of Italianity: class.
There is so much of it in this music that pleases both men and women. That is good for listening, as a background for cooking or relaxing (even Davis dedicated works to the two activities...) or, how nice it is to use ancient phrases, fading, obsolete, dead, and beautiful, to court a lovely woman.
Here it is: the country and cultured profile of this man with the saxophone will be greatly missed.
Even if, as increasingly happens, it will be a niche sentiment. Few of us will probably remember him, but with such great affection that it will equal, or rather vastly surpass, the trumpets and trombones that all media would raise to mark the departure of the latest TV comedians.
That beautiful blowing, technical and heartfelt. That hornet, never annoying. That sound simply "beautiful" pours out from the stereo, accompanied by the best of our country's old pianos (and one of the best overall).
And the only pity is that it isn't a vinyl.
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