Tiziano Ferro on tour: “More than 30 pieces, I’ll sing like crazy”

“There will be more than 30 songs in the setlist, I will sing like crazy until I destroy myself”, smiles Tiziano Ferro on the eve of his new stadium tour. The first stage, date zero, is scheduled today, in Bibione. The setlist will open with “Sono un grande”, title track of his latest album, and will close with “Perdono”. In the live marathon that awaits him there will also be room for guests. “My idea is to bring all the guests of the deluxe on the various dates – he reveals – on June 6th Lazza will be with me at San Siro, on June 7th Ditonellapiaga and Shiva, Giorgia and Ariete will be in Rome, while this time Massimo Ranieri I want to leave him alone (laughs, ed.). At the moment the first applications I have had are these and I am very happy to share the stage with these artists, because without them I wouldn’t sing the songs in the deluxe: they are not collaborations tacked on there. The deluxe is not a project made just for the sake of it, like many others. They are heartfelt, desired collaborations, and without these guests I would lose inspiration and I wouldn’t be able to sing those songs. To make ‘XXdono’, for example, I let myself be directed by Lazza, literally, and I didn’t say ‘a’. We were in Los Angeles. This is because I really wanted Lazza to be Lazza“. But what has never really changed? “I’ve already said it: I don’t feel special, I think people come to my live shows for the empathy I convey. What has never changed is how I approach a live performance at the stadium, I approach it as if it were my last.”

One of the recent and fruitful collaborations was the one with Shiva: two songs released, “Il baci di Giuda” contained in “Vangelo” by the rapper from Corsico, and “Felici a mezzo”, present in the deluxe of “Sono un grande” by Ferro. “I’ve always enjoyed collaborating with artists. I worked with Linea 77, with Mina, I was a backing vocalist, with Sottotono, I did a feat with Frankie Hi-NRG. I listen to a lot of music. Before coming here to Los Angeles I met Cristina Scabbia from Lacuna Coil, because we had never met before – says Ferro – sometimes my colleagues, when they become important, start to ‘enough’. I’ve never understood this. Young people do a lot of featuring, while among artists my age there are few who still get involved with others. I believe that Elisa and I are the two of our generation who have done the most collaborations in recent yearsThen a reflection on the judicial news that interested him Shiva: “On his legal troubles I would only allow myself to say that, in a world of cowards, of people who run away and often don’t pay for what they do, he has made his own journey and I think he should now be left alone”.

Another important piece of the deluxe is “In Naples”. “It’s my favorite unpublished piece. I wrote it three years ago: it’s not particularly cheerful, because it talks about separation and deals with the acceptance of that process – he continues – I wrote it in a magical moment: Napoli had won the scudetto, they honored me with a shirt with Maradona’s number 10, Massimo Ranieri gave me some bracesand right there, in that city, that song was born, after a long period in which I could no longer write because I was very blocked. It marked the beginning of writing the new album, even if it didn’t end up on the album but in the deluxe, because I didn’t want the album to talk about that kind of problem. I wanted the album to communicate: ‘I’m great.’” There’s a passage with very strong words: “don’t manipulate me anymore.”We often talk about injury and self-harm, but very little about mental abuse. Yet mental abuse is horrendous, because it is invisible: the bruises of that abuse do not exist. In that passage the song talks about exactly this,” he continues.

Another moment that struck, this time in the re-release of “XXverso” with Ditonellapiaga, is when he says “fuck the fasci”. Words that arrive at a particular historical moment in which there is a debate on the role of artists and how right it is for them to expose themselves or not, also in light of Francesco De Gregori’s latest statements: “I’m almost fifty years old and I want to say what I think more directly. It pisses me off at the idea that there might be people who would like fewer rights for my children. If you want to attack gays, attack gays, but children should be left alone. It’s not a question of taking sides or not, but simply of saying what you think”.