Maria Moramarco, Fabio Mina, and Francesco Savoretti
Together they make music that challenges, even as it lulls with an airy, floating beauty. But the project is more than music - the other element is stone, in the form of sculpture by Vito Maiullari, who is crediting with inspiring the music, and possibly some of the stone percussion instruments - the opere sonore in pietra that are played, thus the album title that translates as "the sound of stone").
Working with flautist Mina and percussionist Savoretti, who also employ an arsenal to electronics and ambient recordings to help create their soundscapes, Moramarco quickly stakes out her territory in the soaring rawness of the opener, “Pietra A Pietra,’ with its drifting, low-key accompaniment that highlights the dry dustiness in her voice of her native Alta Murgia (in the boot of Italy) in her voice, as the soft trumpet of guest Markus Stockhausen flows in and out of the music like a distant sound carried on the breeze. Although the compositions are all original, they seem to be cut from ancient stone with history thanks to Moramarco’s voice. Listen to the instruments, though, and this is a resolutely contemporary album, as the instrumental “Pietra E Polvere” (Stone and Dust) shows. It slithers, snake-like, the flute bringing light and airiness, as well as enough shifts to astonish the ear. As soon as you believe you have it pegged as one thing, the album alters its musical shape.
“Pietra E Aia” (Stone and Farm) for example, sparse and percussive, turns its gaze south, across the Mediterranean to North Africa, emphasizing the natural connections between them, with Moramarco’s voice almost rising high like an incantation. That’s apt. There’s certainly magic here. It’s an album that seems to resonate with the otherworldly, with only the voice as any kind of anchor in the work otherwise undefined by place or time – while “Pietra E Pastori” (Stone and Shepherds) seems to hark back to Moramarco’s earlier, sparse work, while “Pietra A Bestie” (Beasts in Stone) moves from the simple and childlike to the strange, another instrumental to carry the listener to the end. Petrafonie isn’t perfect. It’s not always as sharp as it might be. But it is an experiment that will keep the listener intrigued and returning for more. As for the connection between stone sculpture and music, Vito Maiullari explains in the second video below.
Vito Maiullari explains his work
"Stone is an organic element. It is made of the animal world, of the plant world, until it becomes something material. Imagine that in the sedimentation over millions of years this stone also becomes sedimented sound."
Further listening:
Maria Moramarco: Stella Aričnte
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Joining with the duo of Fabio Mina and Francesco Savoretti, with Pietrafonie, Italian singer and folklorist Maria Moramarco offers up something drastically different from the pared-to-the-bone songs that made up her last release, Stella Airente.
