Muto in musica

Muto in musica is a live scoring project devoted to Neapolitan silent cinema, with particular attention to the work of Elvira Coda Notari, the first woman director in the history of Italian cinema. The project stems from the desire to make those images resonate again today, images that survived time and censorship, through a direct dialogue with live music.

The musical direction is entrusted to the Passo 16 collective, made up of musicians, composers, and performers engaged in reinterpreting Naples’ visual and sonic heritage. Among its leading figures are Michele Signore (violin, plucked strings, composition) and Antonella Monetti, known artistically as Dolores Melodia (voice and accordion), joined on some occasions by larger ensembles and by acoustic instruments, winds, and guitars, at times also including original texts written for the occasion.

Each live score is conceived as a unique experience, restoring silent cinema to its performative and collective nature. In some cases, as with ‘A santanotte (1922), the film has been accompanied by music and texts composed specifically for it and performed in their world premiere. In others, such as Fantasia ‘e surdato or L’Italia s’è desta (1927), the Melodia/Signore duo has created an intimate, evocative atmosphere, capable of sustaining the emotions of the narrative with just a few essential elements.

Muto in musica is conceived as a travelling project to be presented in five Italian cities – Naples, Rome, Florence, Bologna, and Turin – in order to restore to collective viewing the living, participatory, popular, and artisanal character of Elvira Notari’s cinema.