Ljuba Bergamelli,
concept and voice,
Simone Magnani,
dancer
> UNA VOCE, performed by Ljiuba Bergamelli and Simone Magnai on the IIC Melbourne Vimeo channel: click here
Programme
John Cage (1912-1992)
Solo for Voice I
Georges Aperghis (1945)
Pub 2
Alessandro Solbiati (1956)
To whom?
Pasquale Corrado (1979)
Com to your Voz
Luciano Berio (1925-2003)
Sequence III
Cathy Berberian (1925-1983)
Stripsody
Vittorio Montalti (1984)
Remix and Electronic Interludes
“… The vibration of a throat of flesh. A voice means this: there is a living person, throat, chest, feelings, who pushes this voice into the air that is different from all the other voices. A voice brings into play the uvula, saliva, childhood, the patina of life lived, the intentions of the mind, the pleasure of giving its own shape to sound waves”. Italo Calvino, A listening king
The Western philosophical tradition has always relegated the role of the voice to an intermediary of thought, a means of giving life to the word. In reality, this communication and expression tool – bridge between sound and sense / non-sense – with which we have been endowed since we came into the world, can be thought and experienced, as mystery and uniqueness, in a different perspective: that of body that we are and not of the body that we have.
During the twentieth century, the attitude towards the “voice problem” has changed because the focus on the body as a whole has changed, and the question of the voice is precisely a question of the body. The voice is the body and it is its living instrument: it is the only musical instrument to have a living matter available that is both an instrument and an instrumentalist at the same time. The vocal gesture allows to translate the corporeality into vibration, it is therefore the body that comes out of the voice.
The heart of the voice is, in fact, in what Roland Barthes calls its grain or “the way in which the voice is in the body or in which the body is in the voice”. The vocal act reveals its nature as an experience of a living and polymorphic body that becomes a projection of itself in space and a bridge to the Other. Precisely because of the complexity of the bonds that the voice intertwines and represents in the relationship with the body and the psyche, an approach is necessary that sees the person in his subjectivity and complexity.
Through an enlarged vocality, which sets no boundaries whatsoever, the discovery of how our voice belongs to us and represents us, of how the voice is not an instrument that exists a priori but that exists together with us, takes place: the manifestation of a state of ‘to be. The intent of our work together is precisely to investigate the gesture (vocal and bodily) by feeding each other on the peculiarities of the other to give voice to the body and give body to the voice, in a path that passes from improvisation to execution. of pieces from the contemporary repertoire that open to the tonal and ontological multiplicity of the body-voice. (Ljuba Bergamelli and Simone Magnani)
Ljuba Bergamelli, soprano and performer. She dedicates herself with passion to the art of the twentieth century and contemporary – with particular interest in musical theatre, performance art and dance theatre – collaborating with artists such as Bruno Canino, Giovanni Sollima, Muta Imago, Divertimento Ensemble, Voxnova Italia, dédaloensemble, I Cellisti della Scala, and performing in prestigious festivals such as La Biennale di Venezia, MilanoMusica, Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, RomaEuropaFestival, RavennaFestival, Reggio Emilia Open Festival, CSR Auditorium Concerts in Lugano, Nuova Consonanza, Teatro Stabile di Verona, Gamo of Florence, OrientOccidente Festival of Rovereto.
She was directed by Fabio Maestri, Sandro Gorli, Marco Angius, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Yoichi Sugiyama, among others. She recorded for Stradivarius, Ema Vinci, recorded for the Italian RaiRadioTelevision and for the television program Passepartout by Philippe Daverio, she recorded with Bruno Canino and Antonio Ballista a show dedicated to John Cage. She sang numerous premieres of Vittorio Montalti, Pasquale Corrado, Luca Antignani, Federico Gardella, Daniele Ghisi, Michele Sanna, Marco Quagliarini, Gene Coleman, Paolo Aralla, Luca Guidarini.
In the field of musical theatre, she made her debut in 2013 at the Venice Biennale in Vittorio Montalti’s work “The art and the way to face one’s boss to ask him for a raise”. As a singer and performer she has made numerous shows including La Sagra della Primavera for the MiTo Festival, Ivresses for the Milan Conservatory, Scenario for the Rovereto Mart directed by Luca Veggetti.
Since 2012 she has collaborated in a duo with the dancer and choreographer Simone Magnani, with whom she created the show Una Voce. She sings steadily in trio with her father Attilio on the piano and her brother Andrea on the cello. She studied opera singing and vocal chamber music with M ° Daniela Uccello and Luisa Castellani; she studied with Maestro Fernando Cordeiro Opa and Marinella Pennicchi.
In 2012, with the thesis Una Voce – physicality and multiplicity of the vocal gesture in the contemporary repertoire she graduated with honors and special mention at the G. Verdi Conservatory in Milan. She gave a lecture entitled The voice in the body and the body of the voice for the Music and Philosophy A Due Voci Festival and for the Musicafoscari 2018 Festival. As part of the Biennale College Musica project at the 57th Venice Biennale she was invited to hold a masterclass on contemporary vocality. One of his articles entitled Il Teatro della Voce was published in the magazine I Quaderni del Conservatorio published by ETS.
Simone Magnani, dancer and choreographer. Graduated cum laude from the University of Genoa with a thesis on Pedagogy and experiential learning in contemporary dance. He has been involved in dance since 1992.
His experience as a dancer was born and developed in the context of dance theater and then moved away and landed on the more abstract work of American improvisation and composition. As a dancer he works with important Italian companies (Sosta Palmizi, Vera Stasi, Arbalete, Company blu) and foreign companies (Compagnie Tandem – Michelle Noiret, Dervisci Mevlevi Ensemble).
In 2000 he began his career as a choreographer. Over the years he gave birth to various formations, including the Compagnia Lische. As an author he collaborates with various musical companies and ensembles (Schuko, Arearea, Lucylab evoluzioni, Max Barachini, Compagnia dei Transiti, Dradanza, Norsk Barokorkester, Ensemble Stellario) meeting the favor of critics and audiences.
His work was born and developed in the context of contemporary dance, collecting different inheritances, from dance theater to improvisational dance of American origin, seeking a synthesis between these two very different ways. His research work on movement is focused on identifying the elements that make it vital and organic.
In his choreography he explored both the rawest and most disruptive physicality as well as delicacy and extreme lightness. His works have been presented in important festivals and reviews including Cango Firenze- Fabbrica Europa Firenze – Danceproject Trieste Mutiny Ravenna Corpi Urbani Genova, Civitanova dance [1] Aerowaves London -Youngblood Leeds- BMA Bratislava.
He runs courses and workshops on contact, improvisation and contemporary dance technique. He has taught in various academies and courses for the professional study of dance (M.A.S. TILT, Civica Scuola di Musica di Desio). He has been collaborating for 9 years with the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory of Music in Milan as a teacher of body expression and choreographer.
He currently works as a contact improvisation teacher with the Danza in scena project directed by Alessandra Costa at Arcobaleno Danza.
Since October 2013, he has created, in Macao, the permanent monthly laboratory No-Man’s Land, an open space to explore the expressive possibility of the body between movement, thought and word.