Carmen Consoli: "Sicilian is a language of protest"

BarcelonaThe Barnasants Festival presents a special concert this Sunday, February 22nd, at the Paral·lel 62 venue (9 pm), featuring Italian artist Carmen Consoli and the Catalan Root Music Orchestra (OMAC). The performance brings together two expressive forces with distinct yet complementary trajectories. Together, they will perform, for the first time, material from the album... Amure luci (Narciso Records, 2025) by the Sicilian artist, who intensely explores her cultural and linguistic roots, uniting tradition and modernity. "I wanted to go back to the roots. Linguistically, from ancient Greek and Latin to Sicilian. And literarily, the album also traces the entire history of the island, including the Arab period," explains Consoli, who, in addition to her own verses, sings of Latin poets like Ovid, Sicilian poets like Nina de Nina from the 20th century, and draws inspiration from others such as the 12th-century Arab-Sicilian poet Ibn Hamdis, as she mentioned this Friday at a press conference in Barcelona. Consoli, born in Catania in 1974, is combative by nature and politically opposed to the Italian Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, with whom she has had more than one verbal clash. She defends Sicilian as a "language of protest." "When I sing in Italian, I'm more poetic," she asserts. Regarding Sicilian, she explains that it is "a minority language with a rich literature and wonderful poetry." "It's talked about, it's very much alive, and it's taught at the university, although not in schools," he reports.

The album also pays tribute to those who have stood up against it, such as the Sicilian journalist and activist Peppino Impastato, murdered by the Mafia in 1978 near [location missing], and to whom filmmaker Marco Tullio Giordana dedicated the film The Hundred Steps (2000). "He rebelled against the local boss, started a free radio station, and spearheaded a cultural renewal because he believed that culture could destroy the filth of the mafia," he says. The song Amure luci (Amor luz), which gives the album its title, speaks of Peppino Impastato and also of his brother Giovanni, who "even today continues to give voice to his brother's struggle by organizing conferences and meetings to raise awareness about the fight against the mafia," writes Consoli in the album, which she has conceived as the first chapter of a journey through her Mediterranean roots, rock essence, and identity as a singer-songwriter. "The second will be in European languages, such as English, and minority languages; and perhaps it will include Catalan. And the third album will be in Italian," she explains.

Before her concert in Barcelona with OMAC, Consoli performed on Thursday at the Teatro la Rambleta in Valencia, accompanied only by herself. She will also perform in Formentera on March 13th, in another concert organized by Barnasants, which is co-producing the tour with the Tradicionàrius Festival and the Italian Cultural Institute—an alliance that strengthens cultural ties between Italy and Catalonia through folk music and contemporary singer-songwriter music.