Un “Pescatore”, una donna, il mare: voci in musica e modulazioni linguistiche (Pierangelo Bertoli con Fiorella Mannoia, 1980)

Two voices weave the textual and melodic plot of the song Pescatore by Pierangelo Bertoli (third track of the album Certi momenti, 1980), written by Marco Negri (with some interventions by Bertoli himself). The performance is by the Emilian singer-songwriter with Fiorella Mannoia. The male one is by a fisherman almost overwhelmed by the «storm». In the memory of his family, he finds the strength to push away the «desire to let go» to the «strong embrace» of «death». The female voice is by his young wife, overwhelmed by passion, who in fear of the «sad color» of mourning does not ant to «drive away from [her] mind» the temptation of «sin». In the background the voice of the sea roars, at first violent, «when its fury becomes reat / and its wave is a giant», finally subdued, when «it calms down and is silent without surrender», but only «to start again». Voices that seem to echo a distant literary tradition of love “dialogues” involving two lovers and the sea (think of some of the most famous Galician-Portuguese cantigas d’amigo). Voices that in reality do not speak to each other in the parallel experiences of the two protagonists. Voices that express themselves with subtle linguistic variations.