AVANTI

Alessandro Cortininbspwill release his third solo LP,nbspAVANTI, onnbsp6 October vianbspThe Point of Departure Recording Company,anbspnew label in partnership withnbspPIAS.nbspPreorder the digital album now and receive a free download of lsquoPerdonarersquo instantly.nbspThere are few more potent examples of the power that music holds over our memories than hearing a song and being instantly transported back to a specific time or place. But what if we could change the soundtrack retrospectively If the scenes from our life played out on a big screen, how would we choose to score them Itrsquos an idea that Italian multiinstrumentalistnbspAlessandro Cortininbspfound himself preoccupied with on his latest albumnbspAVANTI.nbspPrior to making the record, Cortini rediscovered an archive of home videos made by his grandfather, who passed away a few years previously. Among the cache were several Super 8 films of family gatherings as well as hours of dinnertime conversations recorded on cassette for posterity. It was as if Cortini had unearthed a perfect fossil of his childhood. The films, however, were missing one crucial element ndash the sound. So Cortini decided he would restore the missing audio in his own way, by composing a musical accompaniment to the footage.nbspAs it turned out, Cortini had a few blanks to fill in himself. The films exposed some inconsistencies in his memories, moments that he romanticised or misremembered. But what surprised him the most was that the recordings appeared to be almost as fallible as his recollections ndash both showed signs of degradation. ldquoI really like that about memory and music, both from an instrumentation and playback point of view, I like imperfection,rdquonbsphe says.nbspAVANTInbspis rich in anomalies and irregularities ndash much like our memories ndash which Cortini let creep into his compositions by recording live on a single synthesiser, the EMS Synthi AKS, without overdubs.nbspldquoJust like the films, there are errors and mistakes in the music, some of which became the theme and some which are peculiar things that happen once or twice,rdquonbsphe says.