The Hellenist sculptors of Rhodes created art evoking a sense of space that is other than real or physical. This feature was underscored by Philiscus: his Muses, so theatrical, have a capacity to overstep the very confines of their own image. At the “Centrale Montemartini” of Rome, the Polinnia, one of the most remarkable images of Greek sculpture, may be admired. This pensive Muse is a young woman dressed in a thick chiton, drooping in bulky folds. She is wrapped in a very light and transparent silk shawl, one end of which is thrown over her shoulder. The maiden is leaning against a rock, her chin cupped in her hand, the other arm clasping her chest. It appears as a self-contained, closed form, one nevertheless suggesting, through its attire, energy surging from its raised heel to the head. The right arm points upward, with the left lying at a right angle to it, the face protruding, with just a foot and left hand showing from under her elegant robe. The young woman merges with the rock, becoming one, while life quivers in her gaze, a uniquely intense stare as it escapes the bounds of the real. A work which intends “expressing the inexpressible”, a cry becoming stone, aspiring to go beyond merely representing the real, which alone is never art, but also the boundaries of representation, so as to express, be it via recognisable figures, mysterious forms. The rock is the frontier of the real, it is Giacomo Leopardi’s “hedge”, that hedge preventing the poet from seeing the physical, and as a result forcing him to find his power of imagination, to see differently, not physically.

Several centuries later, many dusks, dawns, tears and smiles later, a great writer Philip K. Dick gave us an amazing tale: A Scanner Darkly. Stefano Frollano’s record led me to him. The record begins with an intensely strident song and ends with its reprise. It is called “Hello!” which cites Dick’s tale, a A Scanner Darkly.
As I was listening to Stefano’s songs, the image of the pensive Muse always came to mind. And I could not understand why. Perhaps, I wondered, because this writer, also in his songs, wants to “express the inexpressible”. Although this is what all 20th century art had attempted to do. I realised why when picturing together the image of the Muse and Dick’s story. Frollano, like Philiscus, celebrates the marvel of women in poetry.

P.K. Dick tells the story of a policeman who, undercover, infiltrates a gang so as to get to the bottom of their crimes. He lives, takes drugs, works alongside them. He installs scanners at their pad, recording everything that goes on, which he keeps a check on, frame by frame, especially when he is not there, on the screens at the police station. He constantly keeps on eye on everything and everyone. He however gradually begins nuturing feelings of friendship towards them and falls in love with a woman in the gang. He realises there is some good in them and would like to help them. He would like to help them change, but has no idea how. An internal conflict is triggered as he starts to question himself, to be racked by self-doubt, torturing himself with a series of unanswered problems. As his thoughts turn to the woman he loves, he catches on that to alter relationships, the others have to be fully understood. And this he is altogether incapable of doing. Horrified, he realises he is himself merely a scanner. Like a scanner, he too just looks on reality, but is incapable of seeing into their hearts and heads. This is a physical seeing, which fails to enlighten, a seeing without truth, a darkly seeing. He would like to discover another seeing, other eyes. For this he needs to force himself to discover his power to imagine. Only imagination enables the invisible to be seen, only fantasy permits truth to be visible, allowing the terms truth and reality to merge. Loving a woman means seeing inside her head, her heart, means first having imagined her, as only this truly enables one to relate. It is imagination, this interior woman, which allows you to understand and love the real woman, other than yourself.

Stefano’s songs tackle this very theme. They each deal with the drama of inter-human relationship, the convergence-conflict with women, the profound essence of which is being a different human being. The rapport, clash, separation, a sadness and a “joie de vivre”, in the pursuit of imagination, of that interior image of women which alone gives you the truth and the truth about relationship. This is the author’s poetry: striving to see reality not physically, striving for a vision of non-physical reality.

And this is the meaning of Hello! … with its splendid allusion to A Scanner Darkly.
The song is sung by the male voice of its composer, while its reprise, at the end of the record, is sung by a woman. In order to be able to go beyond a scanner darkly, imagination needs to be found, the interior image of women; his own male identity, his voice, form the middle section, and the opening song at its reprise at the end, is sung by a woman’s voice: imagination, it is the author’s female interior which is singing.
And it is precisely this which is Stefano Frollano’s great insight.

Hello is an extremely melancholic, stridently tender song, It is the key so as to comprehend every song: going beyond scanner darkly.
Hello! tells of the loss of someone, a definitive separation. The discovery of one’s own scanner darkly leads to pain being found. Tearful eyes moistening fingers, so as to be able to touch the pain of the loss, the pain of one’s own inadequacy. Although thanks to these tears, hope’s light is also found, the hope of seeing differently, not merely physically. The lost one may be imagined, reinvented, his whole truth found as only some imagination is capable of doing. The full meaning of the relationship may be found, of yours and the other’s, rejecting absence. Only imagination has the power of finding still alive those who are lost, so as to be able to say “Hello!”

On opening, Stefano’s voice is like a whispering winter wind, abounding in light, driving away the fallen dead amber leaf. Stefano’s performance recalls the voice of Clint Eastwood in the song Honkytonk Man, in the film of the same name. It is a rasping whisper in stretches tinged with gruff and passionate inflections. Hello! is the beginning and the end of this musical journey.
In the final reprise, the soft and strident tempo of Stefano’s guitar is accompanied by a female voice, Gabriella Paravati’s. It is once again another brilliant performance. At first it is contentedly unsure, emotion overwhelming the technique, a voice delicately lacerated by pain, full of passion. During the first musical lines it is like hearing a young girl sing, then through virtually indiscernible phases, the following sentences appear to be sung by the same, although now adolescent person, while the others, with fresh nuances, again appear to be performed by the very same girl, but now with the confidence of an adult woman.

Different female voices alternate in the other songs (Daria Venuto, Chiara De Nardis, Paola Casella and Laura Visconti). Representations of Frollano’s imagination, which in turn embody several real women. And always striving to invent a language which speaks of separation, tenderness, tears and smiles, of falling in love. “When you’’ awake in an secret sky..” says Chagall’s Song, and then a famous picture by the Russian painter, The Walk, in fact springs to mind: “When you fly above me…I will love you”. A magical world where the shells can laugh (Fallin’ Apart); where it is possible to “change the clock to be able to see you again” (Sense Of You). And this is the meaning of the relationship with real women, and this is the meaning of the real interior women; a true convergence, which may be the realising of identity, development, creativity. A meaning, “a self-sense of you”, you woman, you imagination, you Muse.

The Spiritual Guidance

 

Stefano Frollano Lead & Background Vocals, Acoustic Guitars, Electric Rhythm & Lead Guitars, Harmonica on track 7 and Tambourine on track 3