© Luca Concas
Lectura Dantis
Arto Lindsay
Voce e vortice
Arto Lindsay rereads Carmelo Bene’s Lectura Dantis in his own way
Arto Lindsay vocals, guitar, electronics
Melvin Gibbs bass, keyboards, electronics
Roopa Mahadevan vocals
Rachele Andrioli vocals, frame drums
Redi Hasa cello
music director Melvin Gibbs
sound Milo Benericetti and Roberto Mandia
lighting design Francesco Trambaioli
production Ponderosa Music & Art
“Lectura Dantis” by Carmelo Bene, Bologna 31 July 1981 courtesy of Warner Music Italia srl
Italian premiere
“I am mortally wounded, so I dedicate this evening not to the dead, but to those who were wounded in the horrible massacre.” Forty years ago, on the first commemoration of the Bologna train-station bombing, Carmelo Bene performed his memorable Lectura Dantis from the top of the Asinelli tower, to a city that was still licking its wounds, and to a massive crowd, akin to a rock-concert audience. It takes much courage to revive it today—the courage of Arto Lindsay, cultural stirrer and language disruptor, who outdid the punk culture from left, inventing a rigorously illiterate grammar for the guitar, through which he wreaks havoc on the slick lines of Brazilian samba, and breaths new life into a chapter of Italian history.
