Mauro Pagani - Mauro Pagani (1978)

El arcón del Mago Alberto sigue dando sus frutos. Aquí, uno de los fundadores de la Premiata Forneria Marconi en su alucinante primer disco solista... y desconocido, ademàs. Otra joyita para descubrir en el blog cabezón.

Artista: Mauro Pagani

Álbum: Mauro Pagani
Año: 1978
Género: Progresivo italiano
Duración: 36:25
Nacionalidad: Italia

Lista de Temas:
1. Europa Minor
2. Argiento
3. Violer d'amores
4. La città aromatica
5. L'albero di canto (p. 1 a)
6. Choron
7. Da qualche parte tra la Calabria e Corfù il blu comincia davvero
8. L'albero di canto (p. 2 a)

Alineación:
- Mauro Pagani / violin, bouzouki, viola
Mario Arcari / oboe (1, 2)
Walter Calloni / percussion (1, 6)
Giulio Capiozzo / drums (1, 5)
Patrizio Farizelli / piano (1, 5)
Pasquale Minieri / percussion (1)
Ares Tavolazzi / electric bass (1, 5)
Giorgio Vivaldi / percussion (1, 6)
Teresa De Sio / vocals (2)
Roberto Colombo / synthesizer (4)
Franz Di Cioccio / drums (4)
Patrick Djivas / bass (4)
Franco Mussida / guitar (4)
Demetrio Stratos / vocals (5, 8)
Luca Balbo / guitar

Quizás al tipo no lo recuerden aunque lo hayan escuchado varias. muchas veces:

Mauro Pagani (Chiari, Italia, 5 de febrero de 1946) es un músico y cantautor italiano.
Músico multiinstrumentista, también productor, ha formado parte del grupo Premiata Forneria Marconi y ha colaborado con muchos otros autores y músicos como Fabrizio De André, Gianna Nannini, Ornella Vanoni, Roberto Vecchioni, Massimo Ranieri y Luciano Ligabue.
Su estilo de canción de autor transita por el rock, pasando por el blues y por la música étnica de raíz arábiga, balcánica y medio-oriental. Pagani es autor de música de películas.

Wikipedia

Aquí, el comentario del Mago Alberto de un disco no muy conocido pero muy bueno;

Para el que recién se desayuna comento que el señor Mauro Pagani fue integrante primario de la Premiata Forneria Marconi, aquel que le daba el tinte classic rock a los primeros y fundamentales discos de los tanos. En el año 79 decide lanzar su primer álbum solista y es aquí donde nos encontramos con él.
Este tipo de material no es muy común verlo en otros blogs. Pero aquí en el blog cabezón nos damos esos gustos, así que cabezonas y cabezones, acá va otra pequeña joya que va directo al rígido.
Pagani posee una cracterística muy definida y es que el chabón no se casa con ningún estilo musical y esta producción es una muestra de ello, aunque los oídos progresivos van a reconocer inmediatamente ese violín punzante y con aire rockero, un álbum por demás interesante como para informarse auditivamente que pasaba por la cabecita de este señor en aquellos años 70s donde todo era gloria musical.
Otra realización que cae al blog para engrosar el mundillo progresivo italiano, mundillo del cual nunca dejamos de dar cuenta. Música sin ataduras y con aire fresco de los 70 para despejar la modorra. Un punto a destacar es el sentimiento que se desprende de cada track y donde de a poco vamos descubriendo un caudal musical impresionante, Pagani cuenta con la colaboración de músicos de primera línea de aquellos años, como así también de algunos de Premiata por lo que esta producción a nivel musical es destacadísima. Bajen sin pudor que esto no es tan corriente como el agua.

Mago Alberto

Imagino que con esas palabras alcanzan. Ahora, algunos otros comentarios en inglès, y no pierdan tiempo, los espera en la Biblioteca Sonora...

In 1976 multi-instrumentalist and music writer Mauro Pagani left PFM, at the peak of their career, to start a brand new solo career. He probably felt the need to get away from the progressive rock clichés and a hectic on-the-road touring life, and therefore preferred to be free to record anything he wanted without restrictions or compromises.
We're talking about his eponymous debut LP, originally released in 1978 by Ascolto record label: a magnificent and surprising album, where Pagani could finally show his love for popular/ethnic music, something difficult to put into PFM's compositions. Almost every of his former bandmates, anyway, plays in this record, together with other great guests such as Area - first of all, their incredibl singer Demetrio Stratos - and the female vocalist Teresa De Sio. This album still sounds amazing today, the first of a long series of releases for Mauro Pagani, who led to the legendary "Creuza de mä" - composed with Fabrizio De André - in 1984.
Released on CD papersleeve in 2006 by BTF/Vinyl Magic, "Mauro Pagani" is now reissued on LP by the same label.
The vinyl transfer has been made for the first time with the DMM technology (Direct Metal Mastering), with the aim of offering an even better sound quality of the standard 180gr.

prassinoscopio

His first (and maybe best) solo effort!
Yes, this is the same Mauro Pagani who used to play in a well known Italian band named PFM and i wanted to review this album ages ago, now i feel like writing something decent. It´s curious to see that non of the collabs have actually reviewed this album, i use to read the reviews of the album im about to review, i hope to see soon a couple of reviews more about it.
So, Mauro Pagani during the years has gained recognition not only in his country but around the world, his work as a member of PFM was remarkable on the band´s music and of course it helped him to gain respect from the same musicians of the best 70s Italian prog bands and some more better known musicians in the local Italian scene.
After he left PFM, he started a career as a solo artist and this first and self-titled album was released back in 1978, Mauro Pagani contains 8 songs and a total lenght of 36 minutes, maybe we could wonder what would have happened if he hadn´t left the band, better leave it to our imagination and concentrate in this great, believe me great album.
I will start now with the songs´review, but first i would like to let you all know that in this album we will find other known names besides Pagani, such as Franz di Cioccio, Patrick Djivas, Demetrio Stratos and Giulio Capiozzo, among others, who worked together with Mauro in this album, and they were really helpful.
Europa Minor is the opener, i love the opening acts because i like to see the way the album runs, some first songs are strong, some others melodic and some other just show a brief example of the music we actually are going to listen. this song starts as it has to start, with a clear and obviously great violin playing with a mediterranean flavour, the sound is not that symphonic oriented, but some kind of jazzy-folk style (if that thing exists), the song follows with that mediterranean style, and there are some clappies, (mm that word remnds me to some known PA charachter who im sure loves this album)
Argiento features for the first time in the album vocals, female vocals actually by a girl named Teresa who actually i don´t know who is or how did she get to sing on this album, not my favourite vocal style, acoustic guitars ala folk RPI of the 70s, a nice melody.
Violer d´amores is a short violin solo song with a classical style, he shows a little bit of his virtuosism, he is a trained musician, if you didn´t know.
La cittá aromatica it´s a nice song, as normal a violin driven song, but this time accompanied by the exquisite playing of his ex PFM mates, a beautiful instrumental passage, great music and noticeable guitar playing, a very enjoyable song.
L´Albero di Canto (Pt. 1) is the second time in the album we hear voices, but this time Demetrio Stratos gave his unique vocal style to this song, we will listen to the piano first, then violin and the odd but incredible Stratos voice, the song actually sounds like some Area tunes, one of the best songs of the album without a doubt.
Choron starts with a flute and a calm and soft sound which lasts almost 2 minutes and then fades out, then a totally folkish sound begins with some percussion which in fact reminds me to some of my country (Mexico) folk passages, then Pagani´s violin enters and the song follows the same road throughout the 5 minutes.
Da qualche parte tra la Calabria e Corfù il blu comincia davvero , i was lazy to write the name of this song so i copied and pasted it from above (lol), now we are about to reach the goal, we are in the final 10 minutes, this song is beautiful, acoustic guitar which reminds me to Riccardo Zappa, bello, molto bello.
L´Albero di canto (pt.2) after a great instrumental acoustic guitar song, we finish this great album which i really enjoy listening to, as you can imagine as the first part of this song, we will listen to Stratos vocals and the Area flavoured song, since this is kind of a reprise.
I like the album a lot, i think every RPI lover should take a listen to this. Not outstanding, not bad at all, an excellent addition to any prog lover, 4 / 5 stars.
Enjoy it!

Guillermo H. Urdapilleta

Mauro Pagani left PFM late in 1976 to take a break really from the world tours and recording studios to do some teaching. He would deepen his knowledge of Mediterranean music at this time as well. This is significant as his passion was renewed to get back in the studio and record this style of music we now call World Music. It's very cool that Mauro gets help on this album from not only his PFM bandmates but several from AREA as well. It would be the following year that Mauro would join Demetrio Stratos and Giorgio Vivaldi (both help out on this record) to further push the boundries of this style of music into more Avant territories in a band called CARNASCIALIA. Well I took the usual route into work this morning as I listened to this album yet I felt like I should be riding a camel on a dusty road in the Middle East.
"Europa Minor" features several AREA members instrumentally and it hits the ground running with violin and a beat leading the way. Aboe replaces the violin before a minute but not for long. Check out the violin 2 minutes in as the aboe comes and goes. I like the percussion 3 minutes in. "Argiento" opens with Bouzouki and it sounds great as female vocals join in. Vocals stop and violin joins in at 2 minutes. Aboe too then the vocals return around 4 minutes. "Violer D'ammes" has violin throughout and Mauro is very impressive.
"La Citta Aromatica" is where Mauro's PFM mates (drums, guitar & bass) help him out. We get drums, bass, violin and more. So much going on. Guitar before 1 1/2 minutes. A great sounding track. "L'albero Di Canto Pt 1" is Stratos on vocals with three other AREA mambers helping out instrumentally. It opens with piano then we get violin, drums and bass after a minute. Killer sound before 2 minutes.The piano leads before 3 minutes in an uptempo section.The bass then becomes prominant then violin. Piano is back then Stratos. "Choron" has flute of some sort only for 2 minutes then a new soundscape takes over with a cool sounding rhythm. "Da Qualche Parte..." has this intricate Bouzouki melody then the sound builds. So good. Beautiful stuff. "L'albero Di Canto Pt 2" opens with violin as Stratos joins in.
Not as good as as the album that would follow under the band name CARNASCIALIA but still a four star album.

John Davie

If you love the contamination in RPI... Pagani is the best example.
'Mauro Pagani' is not a solo work but a band album by Mauro Pagani and other italian musicians that love the Arabic music. This is the messae by Mauro Pagani in album sleevenotes. And sure this is true.
The music is not too pure RPi but it is clear that the 1st song of this album ('Europa Minor') is a pure Area's song. But it is clear that 'Mauro Pagani' is not only 'Europa Minor'. 'Mauro Pagani' is also a possessed Teresa De Sio in 'Argiento' or Demetrio Stratos voice in 'L'albero Di Canto' (eng: 'The Singing Tree'). It is true that the Arabic influences are used for a new RPI version and experience and for this motive 'Mauro Pagani' is more in the way of Peter Gabriel contaminations that in Aktuala style way. The magic and the emotions of 'Mauro Pagani' are not in first plan but if you love RPI this album is a pure recommended album.
In my vision 'Mauro Pagani' is not comparable to PFM (Pagani's previous band) but with Area or Aktuala (this last band in improperly way).
The production and sound mix are OK and the mini LP package (BTF reissue on Italian Prog series) is extremely good.

Andrea

Highly recommended! Not only but especially for AREA-Fans. Very passionate progfusion, clearly related to AREA (look at the lineup) more than to PFM (look at the lineup). Strong eastern-mediterrenean folk influences, irresistable rhythms, melodies and solos especially from Mauro on violin an diverse flutes. Also irresistable vocals from Demetrio Stratos and Theresa de Sio. Get it! Its a true gem.

Cometa Rossa