Sezze (Latina, Italy) July 29th, 1943 - Ariccia (Rome, Italy) October 27th, 2013
On 27th
October of 2013 we lost Graziella Di Prospero, she was journalist,
researcher, writer, screenwriter and scriptwriter. Anyway I knew
her above all as a folksinger performing popular songs of Southern
Lazio, especially from Sezze area, where she was born and raised.
I started listening to folk music when I was still a teenager
and Graziella's voice and the songs she sang, were for me a kind
of call of the wild, maybe because they were so similar to Ciociaria
song that I learned from my mother, my grandmother and my aunts,
maybe because I started to have the themes of suffering and struggles
of workers, so brutally exploited in the countryside, at heart
(and still I have today).
One of Graziella's songs that I never forgot, even though I haven't
listened to it for decades is "Tengo ‘no bove se
chiama Rosello" (My ox is named Rosello), the title track
of 1975 album, which is about an ox-driver talking with his ox
that, seeing the position of the sun above the horizon, would
like to stop plowing and put an end to his endless workday. But
the ox-driver, exploitation fellow of the animal, asks him to
keep on pulling, because their common master never gets tired
of the work of others, and demands them to make a hundred plough
turns ("votate") per working-day. Their master,
says the ox-driver "pulls our skin out, he spreads it
on the shrubs and then he sells it" (link
for the lyrics). Along the past forty-plus years I have listened
to many popular songs, from many lands, near and far, but I've
never heard a song like that, with such a strong solidarity between
man and animal, seen as a real workmate. I always kept in my mind
the air and the lyrics of this song, as well as the warm and sorrowful
voice of Graziella while she sang it, even if I hadn't been listening
this piece for at least thirty years (now, after learning of the
death of Graziella, I found and bought the disc on e-bay and finally
I can listen at it again).
Graziella knew how to
find these songs and give them back to us with her beautiful voice,
making us feel fellows and comrades to the labourer that for a
starvation wage works so hard that his soul makes her own way
("l'anema se va pe' conto suo"), or to the child
who doesn't want to go to school because his teacher beats him
and steals his lunch, or the woman who was born unlucky in her
swaddling clothes ("so' nata sfortunata in de le fasce")
because she was born a woman, but despite this she doesn't tremble
and says "we are stronger than columns" ("semo
più forte noi che le culonne").
I saw Graziella several times, she was always on stage with her
guitar and I was in the audience to clap my hands, the last time
must have been in the late 70's in Rome, piazza degli Euganei,
in Tufello district, bagpiper Francesco Splendori accompanied
her, and maybe also a concertina player was on stage. I enjoyed
her concert very much and I didn't know that it was the last one
I attended. In the following years I tried in vain to find news
about Graziella, when You tube appeared I tried there too, with
very few results. Then one day, searching on internet, I learnt
that Graziella passed away, and with that person I had only seen
from afar, up there on the stage with her guitar in her hands,
I felt I had lost a beloved person, so the very same day I created
this page, as a tribute and thanks to Graziella, hoping to make
her known to the largest number possible of people.
About
Graziella
From the little information
I can learn from internet I know that Graziella Di Prospero was
born in Sezze on July 29th, 1943, she studied and lived for a
long time in Rome, she was active since the mid-sixties to the
early eighties, as a singer , writer, screenwriter and scriptwriter
for cinema and television (see
"bibliography" at the foot of the page), journalist, satirical actress
and folk music researcher, collecting, since the Seventies, together
with her partner, the cartoonist Giorgio
Pedrazzi, more than 300 hours of field recordings, mainly
from Southern Lazio, which partly she reinterpreted in her records
and concerts.
Most of the recordings were transcribed in the collection: “Itinerario
della memoria, Una ricerca di canti, detti, proverbi, testimonianze
della tradizione popolare del Lazio” (A Route of Memory,
A Search for Songs, Sayings, Proverbs, Testimony of the Lazio
Folk Tradition). Moreover Graziella was the author in 1977
of the radio broadcast of Rai (the Italian public broadcasting
corporation) Radiotre channel ”Sezze - La Passione raccontata
dai protagonisti. Religiosità Popolare, Canti e Testimonianze
sulla settimana santa” (Sezze - The Passion Told by the
Protagonists. Popular Religiousness, Singing and Testimonies on
Holy Week), for which George Pedrazzi, co-wrote the texts, and
in 1980 of the TV film of Rai 3 channel ”Itinerario della
memoria” (Route of Memory) (source: http://www.antiwarsongs.org).
The artist recorded
three albums with Fonit Cetra, in the Folk series, directed by
Giancarlo Governi, she gave concerts and tv performances, and
collaborated with various artists of the folk scene of Lazio,
like Ettore De Carolis, the concertina player Pino Pontuali from
Anguillara Sabazia and the bagpiper Francesco Splendori, from
Anticoli Corrado.
Graziella took an active part in the working group on popular
traditions of the Cultural Center Section of the Italian Communist
Party (PCI), coordinated by Sergio Boldini, with the accessions
and collaborations of artists such as Caterina
Bueno, Omar Calabrese,
Maria Carta, Gilberto Giuntini,
Enzo Gradassi, Ivo Lisi, Paolo
Natali, Giorgio Pedrazzi,
Eliana Pilati, Alberto Sobrero, Renato
Sitti and Antonio Uccelli (source:
http://www.antiwarsongs.org).
Therefore Graziella was
part of the cultural and political movement aimed to recover the
culture produced by lower classes, rescuing it from the oblivion
in which rural flight and spread of television relegated it, above
all by saving their voices with recordings made in the villages
and in the countryside, without which we would have lost forever
these testimonies. But the work of Graziella and others went further:
having a wonderful voice, she decided to bring these songs to
life and make them known to the children and grandchildren of
the peasants and shepherd who produced them.
The songs revived by Graziella never appear as a vintage project,
as archeological finds put back into life, on the contrary her
great voice made them alive, recalling the emotions and giving
back the emotions of those who created them, urged by pain, love
or anger of lower classes, oppressed by exploitation, sexual or
political discrimination and poverty.
Moreover the lyrics of these work and struggle songs give a testimony
of the conditions in which laborers, shepherds and workers lived,
seen from their own point of view which is very different from
that we can find in scientific or parliamentary investigations,
even accurate, but produced by middle class members, and therefore
biased by communication problems and reserve that can not be found
instead in popular songs and poetry, which, since had been handed
down, are guaranteed as truthful and sincere.
Together with some of the women participating in the working group
at the PCI, cited above, Graziella was the emblem and symbol of
the struggle in defense of women's rights, and on several occasions
she was invited to perform some of her pieces in popular feasts
organized by protest movements. For the same reason in 1989 she
was invited to perform in Los Angeles, as one of the most representative
artists of the Italian folk traditions (source: http://www.antiwarsongs.org).
It's not easy to describe Graziella's voice, it's a mighty, daring,
warm, expressive voice, probably the best thing is to listen to
her on music or video-sharing websites, for the little that was
uploaded there (see
"online videos" at the foot of the page); it would be nice to find her
three albums released in a digital version, maybe one day somebody
will do it.
Tributes
to Graziella
Some of Graziella's songs were featured by the group Canusìa.
from Sezze, by Banda Jorona,
Lavinia Mancusi.
Mantice, Sara Modigliani and others, and
even before her death, various tributes were dedicated to her,
such as benefit concert "Il folk è vita"
(Folk Music is Life) in Sezze on 25th November 2006 (link),
the event dedicated to Graziella on August 19th,
2008, in the 8th Edition of Civitella Alfedena
Folk Festival (province of L'Aquila) (link)
and "Omaggio a Graziella Di Prospero" ("A
tribute to Graziella Di Prospero") in Bassiano, on May 19th,
2012 (link),
during which the project of the "Centro di musica popolare
dei monti Lepini" (Lepine Mountains Center of Popular
Music) dedicated to Graziella was presented.
At her funeral, that took place at the cemetery of Ariccia, a
small town where she lived for years with her husband George Pedrazzi,
and his son Francesco, besides relatives and close friends, took
part the Mayor of Sezze Andrea Campoli, who commemorated Graziella
with these words: “I offer on behalf of the city of Sezze
my condolences for the death of a personality who, with her passion
and with her undoubted artistic talent has helped to make known,
hand down and promote an extraordinary heritage of popular culture
and art that connote the identity and traditions of our community"
(source: http://www.onirikaedizioni.it).
Paraphrasing Fabrizio De André I can say that it was better
mourning Graziella than having never known her, and in any case
artists like her survive even their own body, thanks to the works
they leave and this is, in my opinion, the only kind of life after
death.
Discography:
Tengo ‘no bove se chiama Rosello. (Cetra LPP 273-CF 22)
March 1975; IMAGE
AEIOU, alla scola ‘n ci voglio ì più. (Cetra
LPP 307-CF 46) July 1976: IMAGE
In mezzo al petto mio ce sta ‘n zerpente, (Cetra Folk
LPP 387-CF/) October 1978. IMAGE
Bibliography:
Graziella DI PROSPERO (1971) Sex + amo = sesamo.Trevi editore,
Roma. IMAGE
Graziella DI PROSPERO, Giorgio PEDRAZZI (edited by (2003)
Cara Isabella: lettere a un'eroina dei fumetti (cover and illustrations
by Giuseppe Manunta). Nuvoloso, Albano laziale. (ISBN - 9788890541926) IMAGE
Graziella DI PROSPERO () Da New York al Prenestino il passo è
breve. (collection of poems)
Filmography:
"Io Emmanuelle" (A Man for Emmanuelle), director: Cesare
Canevari (release: September 11th, 1969): screenplay and story from the tale
"Disintegrazione 68"). link
with IMDB
Online videos:
So' nata sfortunata in de le fasce https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-vThVKWRgA
So' ito a laura' 'lla banditella https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDX027UQGA4
La Pasquella https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3p1h_2NULDA
Stornelli ciociari (Alla zampogna) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4sPuuMtRx8
Arbere sicche (Canto alla zampogna) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JE8jw8nLjqQ
Tengo ‘no bove se chiama Rosello
(beginning of the video, then tribute by Sara Modigliani and
Mantice) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-G6_TCJXuM
Alziti bella (Sara Modigliani) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7V4eMJDczU
Stornelli anticlericali del '48 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBHLacUfiDQ
Stornelli anticlericali del '48 ( Canusia ) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3O6VymBr5I
La Cecilia (Canusia) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuNoL_5fxn4
Saltarello dell'infamità (Canusia) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ju4qaeE_zCU
Caro capoccia non tanta aroganza (Bianca Giovannini, Alessandro
Mazziotti) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssu_sIPKCoQ
Website visited:
http://www.musicapopolareitaliana.com/band-artisti/graziella-di-prospero/
http://www.musicapopolareitaliana.com/musicapopolareitalianablog/2014/07/24/graziella-di-prospero-la-ricercatrice-dei-lepini/
http://www.antiwarsongs.org/artista.php?id=12800&lang=it&rif=1
http://digilander.libero.it/gianni61dgl/grazielladiprospero.htm
http://www.lazio.net/forum/index.php?topic=20219.0
http://www.setino.it/mc-2006-07.htm
http://www.alfonsotoscano.it/forum/ReplyNew.asp?RepId=713&H_ID=36&r_id=18994&Orgin=0&pageid=3
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0123916/?ref_=nm_flmg_wr_1Di
Prospero
l'Unità, photo archive http://archiviofoto.unita.it/index.php?f2=recordid&cod=7888&codset=SPE&pagina=405#foto_2
(no more active)
http://www.onirikaedizioni.it/2013/10/sezze-piange-la-scomparsa-di-graziella-di-prospero-il-cordoglio-del-sindaco-campoli/
(no more active)
Links:
page
created: October
3rd 2014 and last updated:
August
11th, 2021