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Rating: Nathalie (Giannitrapani) is a singer-songwriter of great talent, endowed with a very expressive polychrome voice and an original melodic vein.
Success arrived at the peak of her artistic maturity, after years of hard work that led her to accumulate a lot of unreleased material; material already appreciated by a small but loyal group of admirers who have been following her for years in her performances in venues in Rome and beyond. The final springboard was winning the Rai 2 talent show, X Factor.
Shortly after producing an EP with some covers and the single "In punta di Piedi", Nathalie is among the "Big" at San Remo 2011, where she presents "Vivo sospesa", her second single. Both tracks will then enrich the actual album, "Vivo sospesa" (2011), released right after the Festival.
"Vivo sospesa", in its entirety, presents itself as a soft-rock album characterized by an elegant sound rather original for the standards of Italian light music. The songs have their core in broad melodic lines built on interesting harmonic progressions.
The melodies unfold through evolutions that tend to subtly erase the canonical verse-chorus boundaries; the whole is rich in key changes, very elongated notes, trills that are now sweet, now aggressive, made possible thanks to Nathalie's remarkable vocal talents. Her voice is indeed an added value: extremely expressive and eclectic, it easily shifts from a powerful scratchy timbre to a subdued and clean sweetness. This multiple expressiveness of the voice influences the very structure of her songs, as in the passionate crescendos of "Nello specchio", "Intimate Colours", "Cuore calmo", "Vivo sospesa" and "In punta di piedi".
Often mistakenly compared to Tori Amos, in reality, songs like "Paura del buio" and "Suspended" are more reminiscent of Jeff Buckley's "Grace". Unlike Tori Amos, Nathalie's piano artistry is very elementary, although effective and pleasant. The piano is an important presence throughout the album, but overall, acoustic and electric guitars dominate along with strings and a few keyboard touches; there is also notable use of the drums.
Beautiful songs are also the softer moments, like "Manteau Noir", "Sogno Freddo", and "Nello specchio".
A slightly different discussion deserves the lyrics. Even appreciating her commendable ability to master several languages (Nathalie is Italo-Belgian), my judgment on the lyrics is not exactly enthusiastic. The entire album is a rather simple and not always effective abstract poetic litany. It deals with personal themes, impressions, and subjective feelings that, while pleasantly impactful, fail to leave a strong emotional imprint.
The value of the songs is almost exclusively in the musical part.
Nonetheless, we are still faced with an excellent debut work and indeed Nathalie Giannitrapani is a remarkable artist. "Vivo sospesa" is an album far from banality and therefore needs to be listened to multiple times to be fully appreciated. We hope that at least for once quality will get the right and deserving audience response.
Rating 7.5/10
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