rivista anarchica
anno 41 n. 364
estate 2011


De André

20 years after that concert in Naples

Fabrizio De André (foto Reinhold Kohl)

That (loser) Fabrizio concert 20 years ago

June 1991. One evening Fabrizio calls me at home, said: "Come on, come tomorrow at my house that is perhaps the right time, we insert a date for the anarchists." For several weeks during the tour is "Le Nuvole - The Clouds". The following day, at home, there is also Bruno Sconocchia, Cose di Musica, organizer of the tour.
That afternoon, trying to identify a location and a date for this concert that Fabrizio is keen to do. We talk for 17 years, when we first met in 1974. In fact there was already a given, in 1982, in Carrara, Fabrizio's support of the anarchist press. But the idea of making a big deal, in a stadium, had not yet materialized.
With Fabrizio Dori, Bruno is looking for a place where there was still a concert on that tour, and while there are active anarchists, for help in publicizing the event. At Cava dei Tirreni success was truly remarkable and Naples, not far but not too close, she had been "discovered." In Naples - I guarantee - there were very serious comrades, reliable. I call them, it excites them, decided to Naples.
Then things went as you can read in the box published in "A" 186 (November 1991) and played the next two pages. Pretty bad, I would say. A few thousand people present, but that date was one of the (only) two go wrong during a tour (of forty dates) characterized by a resounding success. The usual bad luck of the anarchists.
The liabilities of the evening is significant: it is true that Fabrizio, Mauro Pagani, Morgia and I think a couple of other people do not "ask for" the usual budget, but others (rightfully) do. And then there are significant organizational costs. And then everything is magnified in Naples: tickets / homage, fines for illegal posting (unwisely made by the local organization that "Cose di Musica” sits in Naples), etc.. etc. ..
At the end of the evening, inside a motor home, sitting with others to sum up, I see a figure in red to shake my wrists. Bruno Sconocchia the (almost) zero, deleting a line marker, the amount of "his" living expenses (about twenty million liras, not quite two dollars). His tribute to the anarchists. Twenty years later I am pleased to disclose that its signature, which is not recorded anywhere.
Remain the importance of the concert, the press conference with the anarchists of Fabrizio Neapolitans, the significance of that event.
What that proceeds, in financial terms, that evening in Naples, then we arrived (and much much more), after the death of Fabrizio, the sale of "products" that we have created by thinking and his commitment to libertarian Fabrizio .
Our friend the brilliant Genoese have gone after, succeeded in having his anarchist comrades a lot of palanche (as he called them), offsetting the large, indeed the greatest, that unlucky evening in Naples 20 years ago.
And then, as we well know, what value have the money? None. Or almost.

Paolo Finzi

So it went in Naples

editorial taken from "A" 186 (November 1991)

It took place at Teatro Tenda Partenope Napoli, September 24, announced the concert the singer-songwriter Fabrizio De Andre - whose proceeds would go to support Umanita' Nova and our magazine. Because of the insufficient number of visitors (about 1,600 paying members), the evening was resolved - a financial point of view - a boomerang: the costs, in fact, were far superior to revenue, and - even on accounts not can be defined in detail before a few months - the deficit of the initiative is estimated at least ten million liras for each of the two anarchist publications.
Apart from the financial data (which is not easy, since the initiative was commissioned by André De primarily to provide a little 'of oxygen to two publications), one could speak of a positive initiative. First there is the data itself: a person who gave the greatest cultural contribution to the Italian songwriters, which is De André, is committed - in times of general disengagement - alongside initiatives strongly identified ideologically and absolutely "minority 'as anarchists are two periods. It is a fact of little consequence.
The concert, then, has had some resonance at the national level, while at the local level - thanks to the efforts by our companions and fellow of the Centre of Studies Lbertari of Naples - he's well spoken, before and after the concert. Just go and read the newspapers of those days, Neapolitans, with their frequent references to the anarchic connotations of the evening. Good sales of publications and anarchists books during the concert.
Beautiful and very visible banner of UN and "A" prepared by fellow Neapolitans. Excited about the concert the audience.
Many thanks for the beautiful but ill-fated evening: the director of the show and the musician Morgia Giancarlo Parisi, who like De Andre have given up their cachet, Franco Canepari and Mauro de Cortes for photos, Fabrizio "Rouge" Villa for the graphic design of the concert poster (reproduced in 1, inside cover of last number of "A"); Reinhold Kohl for archive photos of De André, the Anarchist Circle “Ponte della Ghisolfa” of Milan, which dealt with the mailings of the posters; Bruno Sconocchia and Monica Pesce of «Cose di Musica» for their willingness, to Riri Contiero given to us by the hand in the awareness of journalists, and others not mentioned here, however, that gave us a hand (including dozens of friends and / or groups that in many places have posted the posters of the concert).
A special thanks to the aforementioned fellow Neapolitans for Libertarian Studies Center of the seriousness and especially the passion with which they have committed.

(«A» 186 – novembre 1991)

translation Enrico Massetti