The Other Ennio: Alessandro Alessandroni

My love of film composer Ennio Morricone goes deep and can be traced directly to the nights spent as a child watching spaghetti western marathons with my dad and brothers. My pop adored those Sergio Leone Films - A Fistfull of Dollars, For A Few Dollars More and The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly, all of which Morricone scored - and raised us to adore them too.



We came away understanding the double layers that these movies were meant to be appreciated on and digging them from both sides: the zany, farcical one and the one whose every grain of bleached-out film stock was completely soaking in dusty romanticism. Partly this was by watching them through our dad's eyes. He laughed at the ridiculousness while otherwise sitting rapt through the cowboy epics, which made poetry out of their desert locales (dad was an Arizona native and the southwest was part of his personal mythology). But beyond our father's influence, what really tied those opposing moods together, in a way that even us kids could understand, were Morricone's brilliant scores, which were equal parts gorgeous and goofy.



The soundtracks Morricone recorded for the Leone epics were masterpieces of kitchen sink sound design. He blended baroque chord changes with Spanish coloring and then smothered those compositions in sound effects, with everything thrown in from snake rattles to surf guitar to whips - all smashed together in glorious analog distortion. There is nothing quite like it, and yet you can hear traces of Morricone in everything from early reggae to Phil Spector to Radiohead to Gnarls Barkley.

But in that sea of sonic madness, probably the most iconic element was the whistling, which, it turns out, came courtesy of Morricone's childhood friend, Alessandro Alessondroni.



Ennio Moriccone - "Titoli" (From A Fistful of Dollars, feat. Alessandro Alessondroni)

Beyond being a master whistler, Alessondro Alessondroni is a virtuoso instrumentalist and composer who plays piano, guitar, sitar and mandolin and has created or collaborated on over 50 soundtracks. And yet, despite his large output and prominent involvement with one of my favorite composers of all time, I had never heard of the eccentric Italian with the redundant name until one of his tracks, "Cielo Verde," appeared on a mixtape given to me by my good friend Trevor Naud, whose taste in music is so good I've hired him to curate my funeral. "Cielo Verde" has to be heard to be believed. It's a little Morricone, a little Serge, a little Fela. Super tangy fuzztone guitars and a sick, hiccuping beat.

I browbeat Trevor into giving up the few remaining Alessandroni tracks he had. It's an addicting sound, but unfortunately there's not enough supply to sustain a real habit: precious little info on Alessondroni exists on the internet, and even less in the way of releases in print. The following mp3s are from Music for Strange Situations, a compilation disc featuring the works of Alessondroni and film composer Nora Orlandi.



I can't get enough of the Alessandroni sound and can only hope that some day more Alessonroni material will find its way to my greedy, adoring heart.

Alessonro Alessondroni - Cielo Verde

Alessonro Alessondroni - Aliante Giallo

Alessonro Alessondroni - Spiagge Azzurre