Franco Battiato turns 70 today (Tanti auguri, Franco!) but he's artistically as active as ever. Not so much physically at this very moment after he fell in a concert last week in Bari and suffered a femur fracture. It sure is annoying and will take time to heal but he already looks to the future. He has no plans to celebrate his birthday in his house in Milo in the shadow of Etna vulcano in Sicily, but says there are friends around and they will gather together with him anyways. Despite the accident he says he has a good karma and his future looks very bright and big things are on the way yet.
Battiato's career covers five decades and he still sells out his tours and sells well any CD, DVD, book, whatever he releases. Young people find him generation after generation while his old fans stay faithful and follow him. He just finished sold out European tour with Joe Patti's Experimental Group, a return to his 1970's experimental sound.
In the fall he will release a special Box including all kinds of his works from documentaries to operas and even new songs and a new cover. Meanwhile he hopes to finally realize the project on Händel he's been working on already for five years.... Most recently he has been working on (of Eurovision interest) with Alice in Veleni, a song that was not accepted to Sanremo 2014, and with Giovanni Caccamo in Ritornerò da te, Sanremo 2015 newcomers winner.
Battiato - a singer-songwriter, painter, musician, director, composer, philosopher, producer and talent scout surely will still have a lot in store for us. He has just only begun..... Over 40 albums, six operas, five films, seven books.... what's next?
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