Before the Gran(i)tour starts rolling, we want to put in our sandbox some information about wheat and grains!
We started by adding to the map of the project the origin of different varieties of wheat that our one-string-bass player Wolfgang Scheibe is experimenting in Maremma, Southern Tuscany.
If you have a project concerning grains (ancient, organic, you name it, as long as they are good), and you would like to present it in the context of the Gran(i)Tour, please write to micalosapevo@pibinko.org or +393317539228.
In the header image, Wolfgang’s grains in the Bruna Valley, Southern Tuscany, as of April 10, 2024.
Some samples from last year’s experimental crops managed by Wolfgang.
The June Gran(i)Tour has been advertised by the Institute of Italian Culture in Stuttgart among “Other happenings in the institute’s area of operation”…in the past we have collaborated twice with Institutes of Italian Culture: in 2007 for the palla a 21 mission to Chicago and in 2008 with the Institute in San Francisco for the “Square around the ball” photo exhibition, so we appreciate this form of attention.
An English version of “Rock in Milano, Blues at la Rocca” by the Jug Band Colline Metallifere, adapted on the fly by Jack O’Malley during the “Rural Citizen Science” session at the ECSA Conference in Vienna (April 4, 2024). A city dweller and a country guy interact on their perceptions of urban and rural dimensions..
The online versione of the article by Luca Barbieri is on the Il Tirreno web site, together with a video to become part of the Summer edition of the song. Below we are providing a fast-track translation of the main article.
For more information, bookings, or to send your 15 seconds of Twist: micalosapevo@pibinko.org or +393317539228.
MASSA MARITTIMA.
The refrain is one of those that could also stick in your head: “Tatti bar” repeated several times. And if the notes might be hit -it’s actually difficult to listen to them without hinting a few dance moves, or in any case letting yourself be carried away by the sound at least for a few seconds – the video could really soon go viral. Groups of people (from various parts of Italy, with Maremma remaining the protagonist), individuals wriggling in everyday places, a horse (but there are also dogs), everyone going wild with the beat.
This is the “Tatti Twist”, the new track by the Jug Band Colline Metallifere, an international and “intergenerational” collective that since 2018 has been proposing “reflections on the territory, on the relationship between city and countryside and on little-known aspects in the rural area”, as they define themselves. A song to which the video released in recent days is obviously linked. The video was assemble with contributions collected through the “call” by the band, which had asked to send video clips with “twist shots” and then return – after a couple of months – a collective result.
How the idea was born
The genesis of the idea is explained directly by them: «Sometimes we try to explain apparently cold topics (nutrition, they cite as an example), sometimes slightly technical and slightly suggestive topics (the night sky and light pollution), sometimes different points of view on “soft mobility”. With the “Tatti Twist” we wanted to give ourselves a lighter moment. We put together the twist dancer curriculum of our one-string-bass player Wolfgang Scheibe (who took part in national competitions in Germany in the 1960s), with the story of many foreigners who discover Tuscany as the “promised land”, they add. In January they launched their “call”: looking for twist dancers for a music video. The call was in fact connected to the creation of the song, in English, which tells the story of a person who falls in love with Tuscany and choses to come and live in Tatti (“I went down to Tuscany looking for a place to be and I found its name Tatti, oh yeah”, the words that open the song, not by accident). «We would like to make a video clip of it – explained Andrea Giacomelli from the Jug Band – and we are looking for dancers, professional or less so, with a preference for amateurs», he explained. It would therefore have been enough to send a video of maximum 15 seconds, by the deadline.
The dancing horse
This is the recent past. Just a few days ago, the video was published. «Since January we have then sent invitations to our fans to propose some twist steps from their favorite “location” and we have added all the clips to the video: the participation was very good, about forty people from various latitudes between Cagliari (Sardinia) and central Italy. We also had some unexpected characters, including two dogs and a horse (we don’t know if a dancing horse is new in a music video, but it certainly doesn’t appear often…)”, they add. «The audio was recorded on November 1st, then the idea for the video in which around 40 people participated, the two dogs and the dancing horse which belongs to one of our fans in the area. Now we would like to receive further contributions and – after what we can define as a winter edition (since the material was in fact collected during the winter, ed.) – we are considering a summer version of the video, the “summer” of the Tatti Twist”, adds Giacomelli again to Il Tirreno.
Video contributions can be sent to the band on WhatsApp (+39 331 7539228); or by email (micalosapevo@pibinko.org). But they can also be sent to Il Tirreno Grosseto on Facebook or by email (grosseto@iltirreno.it); then they will be turned over to the musical group.
Tatti in the world
Returning to the words of the song, the “Tatti” referred to in the text – the band explains in their note – are two: the hamlet of Massa Marittima in the Colline Metallifere, where two of the members of the group live, while the Tatti bar «is a well-known venue in Stuttgart, which took its name from the Maremma village”, as we wrote in recent months when talking about a tour of the band.
The Tatti Twist, they recall, is one of the six songs produced by the Colline Metallifere Jug Band during the winter. And now the next period mark on your calendar is June with the Gran(i)Tour in Germany, with a stop also in Rovereto (Trento): «And an international preview in Vienna for the European Citizen science conference with Jack o’Malley representing the group.”
Jack O’Malley (maybe?) at the end of the 2023/2024 Winter.
We announced in early January that a delegation from the Jug Band Colline Metallifere (namely Jack O’Malley and Mauro Tirannosauro) would have been attending the fifth European Citizen Science Association conference.
This is a medium-large event for a congress (around 500 participants), with a significant presence of extra-European folks. The topic is “citizen science”, where any citizen can become an active component of a research team, interact with professional researchers (especially in data collection) and help improve how society addresses some of its challenges with such an approach.
With the pibinko.org network we work in this domain since 2008. Our flagship projects are the buiometria partecipativa on light pollution project and our community maps, so we were curious of interacting with other projects on a global scale. In the meantime, together with parts of the Jug Band Colline Metallifere, we brought parts of our stories, including some wheat ears selected by Wolfgang Scheibe in the context of his rural regeneration projects in Southern Tuscany. Putting together these ingredients, and Mauro Tirannosauro in great shape, we had the possibility of presenting to a wider audience our upcoming Gran(i)Tour. In addition, we provided a little sample of our live entertainment at a workshop on citizen science and rural communities.
The initial idea for our presence in the workshop was to propose some songs from our “music and territory” repertoire. These were to be from our Italian songs, since listening to Italian is interesting for many non-Italian listeners, with the idea of showing the translation of the lyrics on screen. As the workshop was progressing, we agreed with the organizers that it would have not been immediate to make this work. At that point, Jack O’Malley sat down and in twenty minutes he wrote an English version of “Livin’ Milano” (the first of the JBCM songs about the relationship between city and countryside), adapting it to the workshop setting (but please also check out the original version). A few more acts followed.
We are now heading South, back toward the Tuscan latitudes. Thanks again to the Empowerment, Inclusiveness, and Equity ECSA working group for co-funding this mission, together with some of our JBCM viennese fan base.
Below, a few shots from the event, as well as some of the m(‘)appare Vienna survey by pibinko. For more information and booking: micalosapevo@pibinko.org or +393317539228.
Following two teasers, here we go with the full Tatti Twist by the Jug Band Colline Metallifere with its extended crew of biped and quadruped dancers! We hope you like it, and if you like it a lot you can also support our project (click here). For more information and booking: micalosapevo@pibinko.org or +393317539228.
In between the grooves, see how the JBCM operates.
I went down to Tuscany looking for a place to be and I found its name Tatti, oh yeah
Then I found myself a house, with a bird a cat and a mouse, and a great big scenic view, and you
Tatti bar (x6)
Se tu balli il twist – con Wolfgang – balli il twist con chi – con Wolgang – se tu balli il twist, o yeah
I play music with my friends, we play music ’till we bend, the amusement never ends, oh yeah
but there’s something that I miss, just to reach my total bliss, and it’s your great big wet kiss, oh yes
(RIT).
More background information about the song
At times we try to sing about somewhat technical topics (e.g. nutrition), in other cases about “cosmic” issues (night sky and light pollution), at times about alternative viewpoints on “slow mobility”…with the Tatti Twist we decided to take a lighter approach…
Wolfang Scheibe: 77 anni e 3’44” di twist come se non ci fosse un domani.
….we put together our one-string bass player’s track record as a twist dancer (in the Sixties Wolfgang Scheibe used to compete in national dance contests), with the story of many foreign folks who discover Tuscany as a promised land. Unlike other lyrics, where we tend to draw a conclusion, here the story remains suspended, and the beat takes over (but we will write the final lyrics at some point).
Since January we then sent invitations to our community, to do the Twist in their favourite location, and the results of this call was edited in the video. Participation was quite good…we had numerous expressions of interest, and within these, a less-shy gang of around forty people, two dogs, and a horse became our pop-up dance company (we don’t know if a dancing horse has already been seen in a musical video, but we think it is quite rare if not unique!)
The reference to “Tatti” in the lyrics is in fact about two places…one is the village in the territory of Massa Marittima, Southern Tuscany, in the Metalliferous Hills, where two of the band members live. The other is the Tatti Bar (today called “Tatti Stay and See”), a very hip place downtown Stuttgart, Germany, which in fact took its name from the Tuscan hamlet (this story is further detailed in this newspaper article from last year).
The Tatti Twist is one of six songs produced by the Jug Band Colline Metallifere during the Winter, which you will be invited to check out together with the rest of our repertoire while the Spring unfolds, as we approch the June Gran(i)Tour in Germany.
For those of you who would really like to dig deeper, we encourage you to watch the December 2021 show at Radio Deejay Fox (with a transcript in English), and this presentation from last September.
Our friend Florian listened to trailer #1 and he immediately got into the groove of the 2024 Gran(i)Tour…stay tuned for the full video on Saturday! For more information and booking: micalosapevo@pibinko.org or +393317539228.
The official supplier for art and painting material in the pibinko.org network. Also provides frames. In Follonica (Southern Tuscany), in piazza Vittorio Veneto 3. For more information: micalosapevo@pibinko.org.
Sunday, June 16, 2024 the Gran(i)Tour will bring us to Tennental, some 30 km South-West of Stuttgard, Germany, to entertain the participants to the celebrations for the 100th anniversary of biodynamic agriculture with our “music & territory” repertoire!
To attend the even registration is required: click here.
From this interactive map you may explore the various events in the tour (the yellow dots), and get information about other situations and characters related to this mission (friends, twist dancers, grain producers, etc). This map is frequently updated. Last update: Apr. 30, 2024.
