Ivan Graziani
Ballata per 4 stagioni

Much has already been said about the vast guitar skills and bucolic poetic creativity of this singer-songwriter, professional inclinations excellently exploited both in his studio compositions and in live performances, which good Ivan managed to carry on until, alas, slightly over fifty years old, on New Year's Eve 1997, he was permanently taken from mother earth.
The same fate befell that meticulous, obsessive sacred demon Lucio Battisti the following year. But why mention the bard of Poggio Bustone in a review of Ivan Graziani?
Simple. Because at a certain point, the artistic path led the two musicians to cross paths and travel on the same track.
Ivan had already caught attention with his guitar skills for a few years by then, having already released a few singles with Anonima Sound, (some under contract with Numero Uno) and published a handful of solo albums that passed completely unnoticed, to the point of being re-contracted with Mogol's record label (Numero Uno, as mentioned earlier) with an already established career of collaborations, including with Herbert Pagani, P.F.M., Flora Fauna e Cemento, Bruno Lauzi, or Gian Pieretti.

Battisti, having recently returned from the United States, in the second half of 1975, began working on his new project "La Batteria, Il Contrabbasso, Eccetera…" which would see the light in February of the following year.
Lucio, who was quite the sly old fox, remembered that bespectacled guitarist, who had an inherent natural talent that distinguished him from other colleagues, so he welcomed him with open arms to offer him active participation in the recording of the album. Meanwhile, Ivan seized the opportunity to consider creating a solo album, so he began diligently laying the foundations for the production of "Ballata Per Quattro Stagioni" with the supervision, or rather the moral support, of Battisti himself. Never was a choice more spot-on.
Many of the musicians in "La Batteria, Il Contrabbasso, Eccetera…" including Lucio (violin) Fabbri, Claudio Pascoli on sax, Claudio Maioli on keyboards and piano, drummer Walter Calloni, and bassist Hugh Bellen, were strongly recommended by Battisti for the sonic section of Ivan Graziani's new album, which proceeded almost in parallel with the recording of Lucio's LP in the autumn of that year. The experience was so successful that the same musicians, except for Fabbri and Pascoli at intermittent intervals, worked on Ivan's next three long plays: "I Lupi," "Pigro," and "Agnese Dolce Agnese" (with the exception of Hugh Bellen, who was replaced in 1979 on "Agnese Dolce Agnese" by Bob Callero). Battisti himself had the opportunity during this phase, besides "Ballata Per Quattro Stagioni," to continue to follow him and to renew his friendly and professional consultation.

Although it was the subsequent works that ultimately solidified his style and projected him towards deserved public success in the Olympus of singer-songwriters, "Ballata Per Quattro Stagioni" could be defined as what allowed him to take flight. It was a pleasant hybrid (musically speaking) between the unknown Ivan of the early unnoticed albums and the Ivan that would come.
It is an ambitious album, and on the first listen, what immediately stands out is the significant and pleasant presence, though not invasive or redundant, of brass and flutes that elegantly decorate almost all tracks, at times dressing some songs with wise fusion and progressive rhythms. Given that Pascoli was the arranger of the album, this is not surprising at all.
Hybrid because indeed, except for the instrumental "Trench", with its rock and captivating tones, guitars are still very sparse unlike his later works, while the piano, essentially dominates nearly three-quarters of the tracks.
The colorful poetry of love ("Il mio cerchio azzurro," "Come," "E sei così bella"), memories ("Ballata per quattro stagioni," "Dimmi ci credi tu?"), of that sad provincial life ("I giorni di novembre," "La pazza sul fiume"), or ironic everyday life ("Il campo della fiera", a 1973 track with only guitar, revisited and enriched in this new version), are the staple themes that would spread for the next twenty years across all of Graziani's production.
Hybrid in some episodes, because it almost seems like the musicians were given free rein before Ivan's own choices, to impose their concept of music. Not that it detracts from the listening experience, but the integration of keyboards, sax, trumpets, and brass, mixed with fusion salsa games, were never the calling card of the Teramo singer-songwriter. But yes, they blend in quite nicely overall, and the result is truly surprising.

"Spring that blooms among flowers and colors and cancels in the rays of an uncertain sun the mossy dampness clinging to that wall..." Indeed, as the first lines of the entire album cite in the splendid title track, it is now the spring of 1976, and very little is left before the big leap that would take Ivan Graziani to Lugano between hair as still as the lake of the smuggler Marta, Vinci's Gioconda at the Louvre museum, sweet Agnese on the heated beach, or the university Florence of the Irish red beard, but the prerequisites to hit the jackpot like at a poker table are all there… and even Ivan "The guitarist" knows it.