Marisa Terzi
Canzoni perdute

Now I'll tell you a story.

A story that smells of dreams coming true, of unachievable and thus unrealized dreams, of dreams that fall apart, of dreams that, only when the unfolding of events finally reveals itself, compose into a formidable kaleidoscope of destiny. In two words, a story that knows life, and of many small miracles.

The first miracle takes shape in the mid-'90s, in a well-known Milanese restaurant. There's a table, men and women on the brink of old age, at the end of a meal whose end is now in sight. Forgetful of diets, they've already ordered desserts and loosened jackets, ties, belts, girdles, corsets, and elastic bands. Months of sacrifices that sink into the whirlpool of a deconstructed tiramisù. It's the Redde Rationem of every end of the meal. That final moment of collapse for every table, where you slide into the realization that the only tonic thing left is water.

The pitiless Mercury of this awareness is a young waiter who, now, in this slice of time and space, impassively delivers to each diner their dose of triglycerides, saturated and unsaturated fats, simple and complex carbohydrates, a phalanx of hoplites of butter and marzipan, descending upon the guests, leaping out of the Trojan horse of an unlikely Souvenir of star anise mousse and almond crumble.

Someone has certainly already asked for the bill and put on their coat, when a lady, aided by the appearance of digestifs, takes courage and, in the silence of the guests and the stillness of the waiter, begins to sing a song. A lullaby of regret and farewell, the sway of a tormented soul, which sounds roughly like this:

Don't give me too much to drink, you know wine makes me speak, and I don't want to tell you anything else about me…

Then comes the melancholy, the kind when I see you leave, the kind when I let you return to reality.

I know I'll miss you, and it will take some effort to forget…

I know I'll remember the times we made love, you and me.

Now the vacation is over, the game of life starts again…

Pretend it's nothing, if I cry, help me tell you it's time, now, to say goodbye.

Simple words. Those of an average woman separating from an average husband. In short, Their love was dying, like everyone's, like something normal and recurring, with words everyone knows by heart.

But this woman is not an average woman: her name is Marisa Terzi, a tough woman from Parma, and her husband is Carlo Alberto Rossi, a man about twenty years older than her, as well as one of the greatest Italian songwriters and record producers of the '50s and '60s. Marisa released her first album in 1963, In Memory of an Unforgettable Evening, before meeting the man who would become her husband. In the years to come, as her husband's collaborator, she writes songs for Mina, Fred Bongusto, Gilbert Bécaud, Tony Dallara, Nilla Pizzi, Peppino Gagliardi, Rosanna Fratello, Renzo Arbore, Luciano Tajoli, Bruno Martino, Iva Zanicchi. Names before which, perhaps, many of us would chuckle with disdain, but who were then part of the elite of Italian music.

But the waiter – who, by the way, is named Jacopo Leone – didn't know any of this. Years later, when recalling that meeting, he would say: "…when serving the petit fours, she started singing without flinching. I didn't even know who she was, but for sure she had the most beautiful Italian voice I'd ever heard. Not believing my ears, I thought absurdly that if I ever had the chance, I would make a record of it.”

Now. You can understand that the chances of a waiter one day making a record are objectively slim, and probably equivalent to seeing Pink Floyd reunite for the Porchetta Festival of Ariccia.

But that waiter, who has made the pursuit of dreams an Olympic specialty, in the meantime graduated in architecture, shaped disorder and elsewhere in his profession, and finally managed to do what he's always dreamed of: applying himself to something without questioning what it is, developing it to the point of realization only after the fact, with hindsight. And over the years, only with hindsight, he realizes he's given life to a publishing house, a recording studio, a shop, an artisan workshop, a museum, a video production company, a cultural association, and a livable library, whatever that means. And in all this, in memory of an unforgettable evening, he can't get out of his head that lady, that voice, those words, speaking of melancholy, solitude, regret, nostalgia.

And so he gathers courage and writes to Marisa.

She replies after a very long time. She calls him back on the phone and says: This is Marisa, the lady who sings songs of melancholy. The two meet in Berceto, on the Emilian Apennine, where she was born and decided to live, alone, after her divorce from her husband. And there, with the crackling of a fireplace in the background, she tells him about the many songs she wrote to keep herself company through all those years of solitude. Songs no one has ever heard and which, as the overused expression goes, she keeps in a drawer. He suggests opening that drawer to make a record, and she, overcoming her shyness, agrees.

And twenty years after that evening in that restaurant, that waiter manages to seat Roger Waters on those benches in that square of Castelli Romani and serve him that damned sandwich with porchetta.

And at nearly eighty – just like her fellow countryman Verdi with Falstaff – Marisa takes a plane, flies to Paris, and returns to the recording studio to create her masterpiece. They decide to call it Lost Songs. Perhaps it would have been more fitting to call it "found" or even better "resuscitated". Because the miracle that the waiter performs in bringing to life those songs written decades earlier by a woman who hadn't sung in fifty years is reminiscent of John Hammond in Jurassic Park, who revives dinosaur DNA from the blood of mosquitoes that lived in the Jurassic and were trapped in amber.

Twelve songs in total. Twelve dinosaurs that come back to life. And then that voice. That doesn't hold a note correctly.

Around her, a faint, meager, minimalist atmosphere. The ideal soundtrack to accompany the ghosts of each of our solitudes, taken by the hand by four globe-trotting musicians with a jazz background, capable of blending the memories of an old lady and the dreams of a young waiter, to produce one of the truest records you might happen upon. Take it from a fool.

Don't look for this record in music streaming services. You won't find it.

And don't look for Marisa in Berceto either. Instead, look for her in Giuseppe Verdi's most beautiful dream.

That Rest Home for Musicians he wanted to be built in Milan after his death and to which he bequeathed most of his wealth, along with his copyright royalties, which still keep it alive today. There, in the same rest home that the Maestro called "his most beautiful work", you will also find him, Verdi, buried in the crypt with the words that D'Annunzio wrote for him, and in which we, now, with eyelids lowered, can also see a bit of Marisa.

He drew his choirs

From the depth of the struggling crowd.

He gave a voice to hopes and sorrows.

He wept and loved for all.

PS. If you want a taste of all this, go here. The first and the last above all.