A classically trained musician since age five, Nardi’s most recent connection to her Italian roots has sparked a new love for what she does. Her latest 12-track tribute album, Via Via – the Songs of Paolo Conte, recorded in Calvi Dell’Umbria, Italy, is the incarnation of her wish to share varieties of Italian music with the world. “There’s more to Italian music than ‘O Sole Mio’,” she says. “This music needs to be heard and I hope to do my part by exposing people to it.
After Nardi and her husband, jazz pianist Ron Davis, saw famed Italian artist Jovanotti live in New York City, she became inspired to acknowledge her Italian heritage on Via Via, pairing modern jazz arrangements with timeless melodies.
“When I heard him sing in the language that I had grown up with and took for granted, it hit me deep,” she says of the performance. “That’s when I thought, ‘I need to sing in Italian and this next project has to be in Italian’.”
Traveling to Italy for the recording of Via Via gave Nardi a newfound appreciation for her parents’ “humble beginnings”, who immigrated to Canada from small towns in Calabria in 1964. The main value she has gained from her heritage is that of family, togetherness and a commitment to preserving the culture through various mediums, from music to visual arts.
A member of the film organization L’Altra Italia and the Italian Chamber of Commerce, Nardi feels that Italian-Canadians should spread more awareness of “how much we’ve contributed to and shaped” a very present community.
“I feel that it’s my responsibility as a first generation Italian-Canadian,” she says of her music. “I’m the by-product of my parents coming here, so what am I doing with the life and opportunities that I have been given? It was important for me to do something that was moving our culture forward.”
For Nardi, completing this full circle was recording the tribute to Paolo Conte, which is set for release in May 2012 under her private label. Though Via Via is sure to entice the Italian-Canadian community, Nardi describes audience response through a food analogy.
“Your mother makes pizza and when you bring it to school, everyone’s nuts about it, but to you, it’s really nothing special,” she says of cultural immunity. “So, Paolo Conte for me and North American audiences is my mother’s pizza to the outsider.”
Worldly experiences have shown Nardi that it doesn’t matter where one performs. “When something resonates, people respond,” she states. From playing the Jazz Goes to Campus Festival in Indonesia before 10,000 people to singing at Toronto’s Lula Lounge, Nardi’s objective is to expose people to the richness and warmth of both her authentic style while seamlessly integrating Italian music.
“When Italian-Canadian artists want to reconnect with their roots, they always go back to folk songs from their parents’ towns, trying to reinterpret them,” she says. “I hope to not only find music that hasn’t been heard, but to create original material in my mother tongue.”
