"While you had to fight for your survival, we were lying in a field contemplating the finer things in life" an Italian designer once told me, to explain why Italy is the birthplace of architecture, design, fashion and the fine arts.
Touches of the Italian love affair with beauty can be heard in the voice of Emilia Vancini. She exchanged the floodplains of the Po river for the Dutch polders. The landscape might look similar - wide rivers flowing slowly through endless plains - but the climate created two very different cultures.
Emilia is an exponent of the culture of the Italian plains. Her voice conjures up images of a cosy kitchen where the family sits down around the dining table under the watchful eye of la mamma. With the same ease she can summon a feeling of tristesse, like in a fado, or the raucous resignation of the blues. But also the sparkling joy of "Things are getting better" or the sweet romance of Burt Bacharach's "The look of love".
In terms of expression Emilia is rooted in the tradition of the canzone italiana. Living in different countries has provided her with a wide range of musical influences which result in a fresh new sound, surprising yet so reassuring.
Emilia's voice is to the ear what Italian cooking is to the palate: refined yet direct, controlled but exhuberant. She uses it to toy with the listener's emotions - like a mamma playing with her flavours. Teasing the tastebuds with the dolce of prosciutto or with the piccante of gorgonzola. Like Italian cuisine, it never bores: it leaves you wanting more.
Joost van Kasteren
Showing interest for music at a young age, Emilia started taking classical piano lessons when she was seven years old. Besides practising the piano, she was also a keen listener and she soon built up her own classical record collection.
However, her greatest musical influence was her two older brothers' LP collection, which included English and American pop, rock, blues soul, heavy metal, Italian pop...every kind of light music from the '50s to the '80s. She spent her youth listening to this music and singing it.
Since there were no jazz or light music courses at the Italian Conservatories in her teenage years, she kept studying classical music and siging in a choir.
After graduating from High School she obtained her grade 8 Piano Diploma from the Conservatory "Orazio Vecchi" in Modena, but an even more exciting experience was giving her first performance as a singer with the Prosecco Blues Band in her native Cento. The audience's warm reception made her feel that singing was her calling.
After spending five years abroad, studying English in London and German in Berlin, she decided to move to Holland. The stimulating Dutch jazz scene attracted her and has been very important to her all these years.
Since moving she has devoted herself fully to the study of jazz music and she has been performing with different groups, including Victor Borkent's octet "Vic's" and Big Band "Straight Life".
Amongst her jazz singing teachers, those who have left a strong mark on her as a musician and as a person are Susanne Abbuehl, Jeanne Lee and Bart de Win.
She never lost track of her Italian roots, recording the cd "Canzoni e standards" in 1998 with musician friends Gianluca Masetti on saxophone, Denis Biancucci on piano and Tiziano Zanotti on double-bass. "In this cd I made a first attempt to celebrate my love of the canzone italiana from the '50s to the present day. In Italy we have an abundance of wonderful composers, my dream is that they might be better known outside of Italy as well".
Emilia studies improvisation and she plays the piano in various combos. She always enjoys the opportunity to be able to see the stage not only from the point of view of a singer.
Nevertheless, the importance of the voice as her main instrument has remained central. In The Hague she met two teachers who have been very important for her development as a musician. With Heent Prins she studies classical singing and vocal technique and with Regine Herbig she studies breathing technique.
At the moment a new studio project is in the works.
Check out the artist's website:
http://www.emiliavancini.comTrack List:
1. innocenti evasioni
2. stockholm sweetnin'
3. my funny valentine
4. the more I see you
5. for heaven's sake
6. musica, musica
7. the very thought of you
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