Il signore delle formiche_The 1959 Aida production with von Karajan conducting the Wiener Philharmoniker is one of the interpretative cornerstone of Verdi’s oeuvre, and one that vies for best edition with Abbado’s (1972) or Price’s (1962). In the film, the last scene where Braibanti and Giovanni Sanfratello meet is shot in a large lawn. A record player plays O terra addio, the memorable final duet of Aida and Radames. And suddenly, Amelio’s film switches from diligent documentary piece on the Braibanti affair to a sort of Bertolucci-esque story, its roots deep into Verdian melodrama…
Music for Black Pigeons_The film is an assembly of footage of meetings of music held by Danish guitarist Jakob Bro on occasion of concerts and recording sessions. Let’s see who appeared in those – most of all made jazz history. Lennie Tristano, Andrew Cyrille, Paul Motian, Bill Frisell. The tunes we listen to bear the obvious imprint of ECM, the record label that published Bro’s last four discs: the sound is easily recognizable, modelled over the years by Manfred Eicher, ECM’s owner and legendary producer. We shall also add that ECM sound is quite divisive within the international jazz community: the chamber music approach, the sound rich in special effects, the absence of Dionysian solos in name of total control of sound doesn’t meet everybody’s taste. One example: in his book on the greatest jazzmen, Japanese author Murakami, who loves jazz, carefully avoids the name of Keith Jarret, ECM’s standard bearer. To us, this looks like an enormous mistake…
