Huge Tip! One of the furthest experiments in library music, this first official vinyl reissue under Sonor Music Production license resurrects a work that pushed the boundaries of what production music could be. Chitarre Folk, conceived in July 1974 and produced by the small publishing company Nike, stands as a testament to Italy's unique ability to transform functional music into transcendent art.
The album is brilliantly propelled by the telepathic interplay of two six-string alchemists: Bruno Battisti D'Amario and Silvano Chimenti, the latter a long-time collaborator with I Gres, Pulsar, and Piero Umiliani E La Sua Orchestra. Their guitars don't merely play; they conjure, weaving avant-folk themes that seem to emerge from the Mediterranean earth itself, yet reach toward universal mysteries. Surrounded by Maestro Sandro Brugnolini's lush arrangements, the guitars float through orchestral clouds that recall his most adventurous work for Italian cinema. Brugnolini, already a legend in library music circles for his fusion experiments and cosmic explorations, here creates settings that are both grounded and weightless, providing the perfect atmosphere for D'Amario and Chimenti's string meditations.
But it's Edda Dell'Orso's ghostly vocals that transform this from excellent library music into something otherworldly. Dell'Orso, the voice of countless Morricone scores, brings her unique ability to use the human voice as pure instrument, creating wordless incantations that drift through the arrangements like ancient spirits. Her presence elevates the entire project into the realm of the sacred, making this as much a spiritual document as a musical one.
The album touches ethereal psych-folk melodies akin to the imaginary landscapes of John Fahey and Robbie Basho, yet filtered through a distinctly Italian sensibility. Where the American primitives sought transcendence through minimalism and repetition, D'Amario and Chimenti achieve it through melodic sophistication and harmonic richness. This is music that could only have emerged from 1970s Italy, where library music producers were given the freedom to explore the outer reaches of sound, where functional music for film and television became laboratories for sonic experimentation.
Chitarre Folk exists in that rarefied space where library music transcends its utilitarian origins to become genuine art. Like the best work of Alessandro Alessandroni, Giuliano Sorgini, or Brugnolini himself, it was created for synchronization yet seems to soundtrack inner voyages, designed for background yet demands foreground attention. This reissue returns to us one of the most singular documents of Italy's library music golden age, when even production music could touch the infinite.
