I prefer the sound of the sea. And what if instead of a noise, as Dino Campana wrote, it was a sound? Then a melody could be composed. This is the landing place. But to understand the Sound Waves project, you have to start from the beginning. It is necessary to have a port, in this case Cagliari, a 40-foot boat, a passion for navigation and for music.
Andrea Palombini takes tourists by sea during the summer months. Thirty-six years old, degree in pharmacy, master in marketing and management, he has worked as a copywriter for advertising agencies and pharmaceutical manager, he is also, or perhaps, above all, a trumpeter, musician and producer. A few years ago he left the mainland and decided to live on his boat.
“When I moved, I also moved my home recording system,” he says. It was a short step from home recording to boat recording. Some musicians have started sailing with Andrea to use the Mediterranean as a backdrop to their music. “I myself went out to sea to find inspiration”. Then Andrea realized that it is the sea itself that influences the music and it is not just a background. The wind imposes its energy and covers the notes, the trains of waves do not allow you to interpret songs of a certain type, but carry their own rhythm, counter-times and syncopated sounds.
Sound Waves, therefore, changes course. “What we did this year together with Federico Ortica, professor of electroacoustic composition at the Conservatory of Trento and sound designer, and his fellow sound engineers was miking the sea, the boat and the appendages exposed to the wind, capturing the soundscape of those who travel on the waves. I wanted to combine this technique with musicians who are able to listen rather than propose, letting nature express their voice through an instrument provided by us and that the artists interact with her in an extemporaneous way “. A journey that started from Palermo arrived in Olbia.
“What we propose in the exhibition is our journey both in terms of experience and in terms of growth, from understanding how water is transformed into sound without altering its expression to the interplay between man and sea. We deliberately did not use sounds to make our music, but we translated part of the sound expression into tones to integrate our instruments, leaving the soundscape intact in its sequence shot. The aim is to bypass the verbal immune defenses that the public has now developed towards terms such as sustainability, sea, development, ecology and all the words that no longer convey what is instead an experience, like being immersed in the sound of a vessel. running through the waves, it can still arouse, ”he continued.
The exhibition premiered in Genoa and next year Palombini, with Onde Sonore would like to touch other Italian ports, starting right from Cagliari. Hearing the songs in the middle of the set-up is a bit like seeing a world reappear in front of you.
Remember the tale by writer Saulius Tomas Kondrotas about the sunsets collector who boxed up horizons and the setting sun and then filed everything in his closet. Sound waves, it collects its aquatic, wavy, windy and sailing world and filters it through vibrations and chords and then returns it.
Andrea Palombini talks about these projects while the mistral blows in Sardinia. “In this period the sea seems to breathe. It seems to take a breath. “It’s a bit like an animal shaking off some guest, like us humans, and starting to live a bit on its own,” concluded Palombini. And when the Mediterranean will allow us to get back on the road, we can also get back on the trail of Onde Sonore.