Claudio Rispoli
At its peak in the mid-’70s, Italy’s Baia Degli Angeli was the most glamorous and musically adventurous nightclub in Europe, a rival to New York’s Studio 54. Spread over four floors, the focus of the club’s over-the-top interior was the moving DJ booth – located inside a glass elevator – where Claudio Rispoli, AKA Moz-Art, hypnotized clubbers with an eclectic selection of disco hits, soul, reggae, Afrobeat and even library music. The off-kilter DJing style he perfected alongside fellow Baia DJ Daniele Baldelli was dubbed “cosmic disco.” As he tells us in this lecture from the 2004 Red Bull Music Academy, creating the perfect night out is “something you don’t do for money.”
Hosted by Emma Warren We’re very lucky today. We’ve got Claudio Rispoli, from the north of Italy, who, along with Daniele Baldelli, worked at a really famous club called Baia de... Claudio Rispoli Baia degli Angeli, yes. Emma Warren That’s it. Which kind of engendered this whole scene in Italian music called cosmic, which ended up being, it’s like the greatest secret that people don’t know about. It was this really intense, famous disco scene which was basically doing similar things, or even pre-dating, what was happening in New York disco. Claudio now has been part of Jestofunk for how long now? Claudio Rispoli In ‘93 we started. Emma Warren OK, so for 10 years now. We’re going to kind of chat through that whole period in Italian music history, your own personal background, and some of the things you’ve been doing over the last ten years with Jestofunk. I think it might be nice to start with you and how you got into music. Claudio Rispoli I played the piano in the National School of Music in Italy before I became a DJ. I started to DJ, like, easy. One summer I started [DJing], in the middle of the summer, because it was something I felt from the beginning. Emma Warren What actually happens to people to make them start DJing? When’s the moment they get their first record? When’s the first time they actually put the needle on the record, on the decks? How did that happen for you? Claudio Rispoli It was a little club in the Riviera in Italy. Emma Warren How old were you then? Claudio Rispoli I was 16. It was a lady that was a DJ. She was French. The club was a little club. They were playing very, very good music, like Philadelphia and Motown things. It was the best period for music, I think. You remember, The Temptations period. Emma Warren You mentioned Philly and Motown soul which, as far as I can gather, became the beginning part of what you ended up doing with the music. That seemed to be the groundstone from which you started? Was Philly and Motown, was that sound really popular throughout Italy, or did you have to be a real music fan to be into that kind of music? Claudio Rispoli No, no, no. There was nothing in Italy at that moment, but the Baia degli Angeli was something out of what Italy was at that moment. To fill the club you have to wait for the people that come from a long distance as well, like Milan or Rome. Emma Warren In order to understand how this club happened and what it was really like, it’s good to get an idea about the general Italian music scene, or club scene, before it started. You said you first started to play at this very small club in the Riviera that was playing Philly Soul and Motown. Was that unusual? Were there many clubs? Claudio Rispoli No, no, it was unusual, because most of clubs played different music. Now if you want to find particular music you can go everywhere. It was the same at that time. In particular, Baia was a club where we [were together] in the afternoon. We live together. It’s not people that work in the bar, and one works on the door. We are friends. We stay together all day. So in the afternoon we do something for the lighting, or something to [decorate] a particular part of the club. This is not normal. Emma Warren The club itself sounds amazing. Three floors, but five different levels. The DJ played in a glass elevator that rose up and down between the levels. Claudio Rispoli It was two floors. Emma Warren Two floors. OK. It was like the most extreme New York disco, if you imagine your ideas about New York disco in the ‘70s. Your club had it all. Claudio Rispoli The boss of this club, I think before he did this, he took a long time. A lot of inspiration he took from New York, exactly. But he went as well to Hong Kong and Japan to see [the new] technology. He came back with a lot of ideas. A lot of things were Andy Warhol things inside. Nobody in Italy at the time knew Andy Warhol. Everything was new. Emma Warren Obviously the way that the club developed was partly because of the personalities involved, but partly because the guy that ran the club [Giancarlo Tirotti] had been to New York and had seen the discos. Is that right? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. It started with two DJ from the States. They flew here. One was Bobby Day. One was Tom Sison. There was also a black boy called Sterling [St. Jacques] who danced incredibly. He went with the lights. It was great. Just [for] one year, then it changed all the time. Emma Warren We do need to talk about the club and all those things. It just sounds like a completely incredible point of history. Before we talk more about that, it’d be good to talk about you. You said that you started DJing when you were 16. Was it something that you knew you wanted to do, or was it something that you fell into? Claudio Rispoli It’s something that I could understand, and I don’t think so much. I feel I do it because it’s just that calling, you know what I mean? The energy was what I liked. Now I don’t go to work, but I love to do it. It’s not because I close something. I want to say something just for them. Emma Warren You said that it’s something that you still do. I’m kind of jumping forward here but I noticed there was an Earth, Wind, and Fire gig to celebrate the anniversary of the club. This was last year was it? Or this year? Is that right? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. Emma Warren Were you playing at that? Do you still sometimes play at events? Claudio Rispoli Just in Bologna. It was so nice because just the summer before we have tour. We have four gigs with them. They played Jestofunk. More was in Bologna, Kool and the Gang, which I love to see because... Emma Warren I bet that must have been a good gig. Claudio Rispoli Yeah, yeah. I don’t think what they do in Italy to celebrate the club comes very good. Maybe just in Bologna. Milano and Rome, I don’t think they do. They have problem. Emma Warren Is this something that happens every year? When did the club close? When did the club finish? Claudio Rispoli They changed the name after 10 years and it was not the same thing. I think 1980 was the last year. Emma Warren It says something about how important that club was or how respected it is that they’re still celebrating it on an annual basis. Is the club seen as being very important in your area? Claudio Rispoli Yeah, I think in all Italy. The ground there is not normal for a place, for a disco club. It’s more known like a temple. Maybe you feel like freedom when you think of that, or maybe something magic. It was something magic. Emma Warren You started out playing Philly soul, Motown, these kind of things. Eventually you become a DJ. You start working at this club. What kind of music were you playing when you first started playing at the Baia? Claudio Rispoli I tell you, I started to play in this little club. I came with friends, with these new people though. They started in the Baia the same year. When I know them, I go to leave there but I work in the little club, like ten kilometers away. When I finish work, I go home and watch Baia. Emma Warren You were going to the club you mean? Claudio Rispoli No, I live with them, but I work in another place. Because in this place the American people worked. I was so young. I got energy. I needed to – I say work, but I needed to play. Then I finish, I come back. The Baia was open just Saturday. I worked all the summer, like everyday. All the people from there came to me, like Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, the other days. The year after that I start to play the [Baia]. Emma Warren Maybe you can give us some kind of idea about what kind of place this was. Claudio Rispoli It was something that you don’t do for money. This is so important for what we talking about. If you take away this from this kind of thing… Emma Warren You mean if you take money issues out of it? Claudio Rispoli No, no, no. If you do the club just to make money, you do something that everybody can do. Baia has a problem with the money. Exactly different, because you can imagine... Every time it gets bigger. In the winter we stop in May. We close for one month to make some different things. But the on last day of every period, all the bar was open for everybody. The people come and take the drink. There are no people that give you anything. You go and you take. The people can take home also a bottle of everything. They charge the bar more than one time, so by 4 o’clock it’s impossible to find a drink. This is crazy. It’s no, how you say, benefit. No, you don’t take money. Now they took exactly. It’s something that is for the people. I don’t know. Emma Warren It would be good to talk about some of the creative things that happened in the club. Yourself and the other DJs were doing things that didn’t happen again in music for many, many years. Playing 33 rpm records at 45, playing 45 records at 33. Using drum machines, triggering samples, all these kind of things. It would be great if you could maybe try and give us an idea about the spectacle of the night. Like, what would you see when you walked in on an average night. What was the picture in front of you? Claudio Rispoli I think the [main part] of the concert is the music and also the lighting, and Baia was very, very incredible because there was a mechanical thing with a big, big laser on and this laser was very, very powerful. Emma Warren This is a big laser you had in the middle of the club? Claudio Rispoli No, no, it was outside and this thing goes on every floor, but also on the sea. If you go on the sea, it was the people that was with the navy that were calling to the police, because we trust them, you know? Emma Warren You’re causing some havoc with the sailors? Claudio Rispoli There is a lot of technology as well, like you say, the elevator, and the problem of the DJ on the elevator, that you push and you go down, and the record, you know [mimes a record wobbling up and down]. We’re talking about ‘76, ‘77. Emma Warren You know, it’s kind of mind-blowing, really, to imagine this club, in the mid-70s in northern Italy that had a glass elevator as a DJ booth. I mean, it’s such a kind of disco idea. Who was it who actually came up with this? Claudio Rispoli I DJed, but in the afternoon I make white everything. Emma Warren So you painted the walls white? Claudio Rispoli Know what I mean? It’s something you do just for your home, you don’t do it because they ask you. All of the people that work together there are feeling like that. We’re going to find all of the particular things, for example, or before the particular day.… I don’t remember, it was Christmas or something like this. We take all the body of us and we designed [inaudible]. Emma Warren You designed... Claudio Rispoli Yeah, just the other thing and then we cut all the things. We make in a long [corridor] in the club, just pink or green, you know, these [shapes]. Emma Warren You were all very involved in the design. Claudio Rispoli Then with the lighted tree in front, and in the night with the strobes, it gives you exactly some movement. It was [our work] on the wall. Easy, cost nothing, it was just something creative. Emma Warren I mean you mentioned with the glass elevator, that the problem you have when you have a DJ booth in a elevator is when it stops on a floor the needle jumps. I heard that you had to find some very specific new technology within turntables to be able to manage this. What happened? Claudio Rispoli It was a big, big, how do you say... [offers Italian word]? Just that cost like three of that [points to turntable in front of them]. You know, because there’s a hollow in the side... But now in Torino, there is another place after Baia, they opened there and they took all the [ideas] from there. They have more problems like this, because it’s a very big elevator, but like a farm elevator, you know? When it starts, it goes like, “Doosh!” And so it was very incredible thing. Emma Warren Would you play in the glass elevator? Would you DJ in there? Claudio Rispoli In Baia, in Torino. Emma Warren What were you playing? What music were you playing, what were the kind of big records for you? Claudio Rispoli One of my favorite groups was The Blackbyrds. I think it’s important group, like also now in the story of some contaminated music like… also hip-hop. I don’t like to say exactly a definition to the music, because now it’s very complicated. It’s a lot of contamination, so how you say, I suggest it’s the limit, you know, or anyway… Emma Warren Is it fair to say that at this point in the mid ‘70s you were playing a kind of very eclectic mix of soul, funk, disco, reggae? Claudio Rispoli Yeah, whatever, whatever. I remember, for example, we play Temptations or Smokey Robinson for example. Then, I loved one track by Queen. They’re not my preferred group, for me as well, but one track was so funky and was so lovely and I don’t know who they are, I don’t care, you know? You like, you play. Emma Warren At the club, you’d hear Smokey Robinson and then you might hear Queen? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. Emma Warren It sounds like a great club. It sounds like one of the great clubs. Do you think that the fact that you did have this very eclectic attitude to what you were playing... you know, you loved Smokey Robinson but if you liked a Queen tune, you’d play it. Did that contribute to it becoming such a great club? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. Yeah, I think it’s something that... the Baia is a different thing. I put myself in a position together... a lot of things for making it an important one, you know? For the music that after that you’re going around to play, you do all just with your hands. Emma Warren I mean, I think a lot of the great clubs in the last sort of 30 years have had a combination of some very specific things. There’ve been great spaces that have had a lot of effort put into them and they’ve had the kind of really wild playlist. You take Alfredo in Ibiza, with the clubs. Claudio Rispoli I don’t understand nothing of what you say. You are like Oxford now, actually. [laughter] Emma Warren What I was saying was that all of the great clubs in history have had two main things with them. They’ve had a great space, where there’s a lot of energy put into the décor, so it looks great, but the playlist has been very broad. For example, Alfredo in Ibiza, with his clubs Amnesia and Coup, they were incredible spaces, really wild clubs, but they played what they liked and you could say the same thing about Studio 54 in New York. Were you aware of what was happening with disco in New York with clubs like Studio 54? Claudio Rispoli I never go there. I just went there like five years ago, the first time I went to New York. Maybe it was better, I don’t know, because I take with me a little illusion, maybe it’s like if you go to London. Maybe to see the States you have to run away to a different place, or you have to take some car, drive or something like this, because New York I think is very European right now. But the music that we played, that period... We had only just one place where it’s possible to find [records] directly from the States, there was nothing... Emma Warren So you’re saying there was only one place you could go and buy records at this time? Was it quite hard to find records or did you just... Claudio Rispoli Yeah. Anywhere, yeah. Emma Warren What kind of things were you buying? What records were you buying? Claudio Rispoli What, when? Emma Warren Just when you’re talking about at the club. Claudio Rispoli Oh. I tell you, I worked with Daniele and a lot of records I play and I don’t listen just in the afternoon. Just like this, because... There was a moment that the record was good, most of them. In the ‘78, ‘79 start, also, you find a lot mixed very, very oddly, and you have to work a lot for... for just take. Emma Warren You mean, it became difficult to mix records because... Claudio Rispoli No, no, no, just because it was a moment that everybody go to find, maybe like now, the [inaudible], no? Also the black people start to play commercial music. You understand what I mean? It’s not exactly what we like. I’m talking about the greats. Stevie Wonder. I have all the old records, but not the new ones, because... I think the great thing he do in the past. Emma Warren Well, I guess that’s something that happens with artists isn’t it, when they have a kind of very strong period and then, maybe not so strong. If we just talk about some of the innovations that you and Daniele Baldelli, who you played with at this club. Some of the technical things that you developed were really incredible. I mean, is it true to say that you would play records at the wrong speed on purpose because you preferred the way they sounded? Claudio Rispoli What is the right speed? What’s happening now with the cutting and the mixing [is also not at the right speed]. It’s something that maybe we do before then, because we don’t have a sampler, but we have a mixer. There was a very, very incredible turntable, because from 35 maximum, you are very near to 45 minimum. The difference is very little. But we are talking about particular music, you can... It’s not tracks like a single track that counts like Donald Duck, or you know... It’s something that has an emotional thing, and if not, you don’t play. It’s not a fashion, it’s not something [we do because other people are doing it]. For example, some Jamaican style. Emma Warren Some Jimmy Castor. Claudio Rispoli Jamaican style, yeah. Some dub. The first dub. Emma Warren You found that all the reggae stuff that you were playing responded well to being pitched up? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. The people that play reggae music don’t think so, actually. [Laughs] But anyway, we was on the dancefloor. Emma Warren What was it like on the dancefloor when you were playing these records? Claudio Rispoli If you want exactly my sensation, when I work anyway, because I don’t change anything, it’s like, I wait for myself, you know? I stay like this, but when I start, there’s something that [affects] me. I can’t control it. There’s something natural that, I say, I feel like it’s from the stomach, you know. It’s not my mind. It’s something like a snake, you know, it’s an energy, like that [clenches fists]. You can say funk, you can say... I say it’s something that comes out and you don’t know [what it is]. It’s like a psycho thing, after ten minutes you work, you are... [makes closed motion with arms] close on that. This is like, for me, for what I think, I say my religion, it's something great. Emma Warren That idea of it being a religion seemed to be shared by a lot of the kids that were coming to the clubs. We’ve heard stories about kids who would drive many, many miles just to park in the car park outside the club, blare out mixtapes and not even go to the club. It seemed like there was this huge cult following. Is that what happened? What was that like? Claudio Rispoli I don’t know. You ask me something. Emma Warren Were you aware of that? Were you aware of these kids driving up and parking outside the club, almost having their own mini-party because they thought what you were doing was so great? Claudio Rispoli This is something that I don’t understand so much, but maybe because there were some parties with a very lot of people. Anyway, the Baia was incredible in the front. [There were] 5,000, 4,000 [people] and in a very little country [that] was also a problem. But the club that I remember in myself better is club that closed very straight. One was in France and was called Goody Goody. Very, very small. It’s impossible to speak in there. The music was very, very like [points up] up here. Emma Warren Literally the speakers were placed above you? Claudio Rispoli It was very, very, very little. I think we do there the best music. The best we play just [with] one ear. The police closed everything. Emma Warren Where was this club? Claudio Rispoli It was between Rimini and Bologna. Emma Warren It was called... Claudio Rispoli Goody Goody. Emma Warren Goody Goody. What were you playing there? You said you played the best music you’d ever played at this club, at Goody Goody. Claudio Rispoli Because I play the art thing. I feel like I don’t have 2,000 people. I never do this. They push you the problem of you have [to keep] the dancefloor. You pay attention to not losing the dancefloor. This is shit in the mind of a DJ. It’s something that takes you away from all the mystic things that you can take with you. I don’t like it. Now it is not important to do anything creative. I feel like this. This club give you the chance for – also Baia – this club we could play the Herbie Hancock thing, the first Herbie Hancock thing. Emma Warren You could play what? Claudio Rispoli It was very hard to play in the disco, the first Herbie Hancock thing was just funk jazz, but very, very, very, very hard, uptempo. Emma Warren A lot of the people in the room here are DJs. Are you saying that for you, you found it a pressure to be playing for 2,000 people? You didn’t want to keep 2,000 people happy? For you it was better to be in a small club? Claudio Rispoli No, no, no. If you are in Baia degli Angeli this is not a problem. If you go in Veneto, for example, and you go where all day they play Lessia. They play folk music. They pay you, you know what I mean? For me it’s no problem. I don’t care about what’s happened but I don’t lose the dancefloor so I don’t have the problem. But it’s something that I feel because it’s my job. This is something that will kill you year after year. In time you don’t understand that you don’t [take] risks. You play the same thing that everybody plays for example. What is different between you and the other? Emma Warren It sounds like you by this point developed a very distinctive DJing style. Over in New York, someone like Francis Grasso was developing a mixing style where he once said that he changed records every two minutes 12 seconds, because he had so much to get through. He wouldn’t ever just let the record play. He was in there the whole time doing stuff, manipulating it, mixing it. Was that similar to your style? Claudio Rispoli No, but sometimes I have a problem. I have five, six records out everywhere like this [gestures around]. I lose [track] because you change idea very easy. If you have emotions like this you make... Sometimes I used to play a record that was one minute and it was finished. You have time just to do what you have to do. It’s something that I want to do. You know that you have 50 seconds, then it’s finished. It’s just a very little part. It’s possible, but if I have a very, very good record that is long, ten minutes, I play ten minutes. Emma Warren Francis Grasso was in the period where
François Kevorkian was producing for Salsoul and was DJing. You had all these seminal American DJs coming through like David Mancuso, Nicky Siano, Francis Grasso was... Claudio Rispoli But everybody these people, there’s one up that for them is the best one, it's Larry Levan. Emma Warren Larry Levan? He was the one that you liked best? Claudio Rispoli No. I see a film this year. I know the people that produce that. I see everybody talking about him like art. I understand that he represents something for them very important. For [doing] this job. For also for the future. You think of him because he did something very special. It’s not possible to see nothing in the film because it was just in the States, you can take any film in the clip, it was just from long time ago. Emma Warren There’s no film? Claudio Rispoli Just a very little, like, second of thing. Because the people can’t take anything in the club that was out of those limits. Emma Warren You had no rules and regulations? People could take drugs if they wanted to, when they wanted to and it was no problem, but there was no film? Claudio Rispoli I don’t think it was just for the privacy. It’s not just for that. Also [for those] in the club that don’t take anything it’s the same. The people that take something, there’s no problem. Emma Warren You must have some kind of interesting memories from your period working in discos throughout the late ’70s. When you think about that time what comes to mind? What kind of stories come to mind? Grace Jones used to come to your clubs. Claudio Rispoli Nothing. It’s a big monument, but just that. Now is now. It’s like your desire wants something that is impossible to have and still believe. I think it’s possible, anytime in your life you have something to chase out, to understand what you can do. I think about music of course. You take energy. You be strong from there. It’s impossible to explain, like what I try to do now, what was. It’s impossible to do something that, “Ah, we do this. Oh, great.” You need new ideas, new stuff, and something very, very fresh to create something. Emma Warren You’re not really into nostalgia for that period of time? Claudio Rispoli No, no, no, no. Not exactly. Nostalgia is just for something that you can see. It’s something like for a planet. Not for a period of your life. It’s gone. Emma Warren You’re talking about always having to push things forward to keep them fresh. It sounds like at some period when you were DJing and you were playing these kind of soul, and funk, and reggae you started to incorporate an Afro sound into the music. Maybe you can tell us about how that happened? Claudio Rispoli When I know Fela Kuti or this kind of music, I love the way you can jump, I love the way you can dance with the percussion, but also the rhythm that he has and the way of singing. So I play that. This [genre] is the definition [but] I don’t like that. The music is global thing. Emma Warren Your music’s a global thing? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. You play James Brown and you are Afro. What is Afro James Brown? Because he’s black? It’s something that gives you… After you see the people with the bongos everywhere. You can say it’s stupid. You don’t need this or this for represent something. Maybe this is a change. Maybe the people are going to find something special about your movement, that is yours. Not because you’ve got a dress here or you go to buy something there. Italy was very long from that state, that moment anyway. I remember the Saturday camps from Milano. People like 30, 40 boys in Fiorucci stuff, the first Fiorucci stuff – in Italy everybody knows, maybe also in the States. They were strange people. Emma Warren Are you saying that kids from London came to your club dressed in Fiorucci clothes? Claudio Rispoli No, from Milano. People just from Milano. There’s a big, big shop in Milano. When they knew about this club, the Saturday they came to dance. They made promo for us incredible. They are people like now you pay to come and dance inside. They just came. This was great. Emma Warren Who are these people from Milan? Claudio Rispoli Just people that work in the shop of fashion. They came to dance like this. In the summer you could find [inaudible], the son of one of the presidents of Warner Bros. Carmen Electra was the big PR of Studio 54. In the summer she come to find us. This is because the boy that started Baia [Giancarlo Tirotti] for first time is from Rome, this boy. He lives in Romania but is from Rome. He is an architect and is a big mind. Now he is working in near to Gabicce, near to where the place of Baia is, and he makes big golf courses. You go inside and there’s the water. You go in this hotel and you walk in the water. He is a great people. Maybe if you think, if it become nostalgia to him, we can do some new thing. Emma Warren Mm-hmm. Claudio Rispoli Because he know what he do. Emma Warren You’re saying a lot of people that are involved in this club scene at this point in Italy went off to do very interesting things. It spread. It had an influence that was noticed in America. It had an influence that meant that individuals went off to do interesting things, to open these crazy hotels or to do good things. Is that right? Claudio Rispoli Yeah, but there’s something that these great people can do, you know? I say this because with the Baia it was him that organized everything. Before the start, he had everything in the mind. He was in New York to understand the way to make this great thing. When he comes back, he can say to us, “We do it like this or we do it like this.” Just run – and what’s come out is this. So it’s important, the mind in question. After him, the life of Baia was a reflection of that. Emma Warren We’ve come to refer to this whole period as cosmic, Italian cosmic or cosmic disco. What does cosmic mean? Claudio Rispoli Was a club after Baia. I make intention to make confusion about this because for me there is any... The period was after, and was very straight on. We started the contamination of electronic things, but I don’t like what start from there. It’s like a circus. The start is like we start the circus. I don’t say only cosmic. You go to work but you go to someone that you don’t know. He pay you. With your energy you can do something, but it’s not the same thing. It’s not like you live with people and they want this and you do. It’s also about business. What we are talking about now was no business. One of the facts that led to the closure of the club was the money that the people wanted. The people that worked on the lighting, the people that work with the music, because it was not always a big business. We do it because we like [it]. Emma Warren A lot of people here would’ve had the experience, the people that run their own clubs or DJ a lot, of exactly that problem of clubs not being able to work because too many people want too much money. What advice would you give people that are running their own clubs, who want to put on really special parties? What’s the most important element to putting on a really special party? Claudio Rispoli If someone asks me to go to play a night now, I don’t go, because I’m staying good now, like this. There is one club that if they call me, I go. This in Perujia, it’s near to Perujia, because it’s very different. It’s just black, there’s nothing. It’s like a cultural place. Emma Warren It’s like a cultural place? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. Just with the speakers, a good, good system, and just music. If this guy calls me, I go to work. Daniele calls me, I go. But if they ask me, “Oh, you are interested to come and do a night?” I don’t go. Emma Warren What advice would you give someone? I mean, obviously ... Claudio Rispoli It’s what you say. I tell you this because, it’s not how big the name of the club is, but what you find when you go. What the club gives you when you finish playing. You know what the club gives you. You can go away and you say, “Great music. I can play good music.” Or you can go, wait a second, huh. Emma Warren So from a DJ’s point of view, it’s all about being able to play the kind of music you want to play and feeling like people are doing it out of love, rather than money? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. It’s like if I go to work with Daniele or I can say a lot of people that work with Daniele. They do half a thing but they do other things, but they also do something that is very far from what I do. For me, it’s hard. They don’t understand, but for me it’s hard. The people, they wait for one kind of music. They want that. And this is something that, in a way, I don’t like because I can play whatever, if I like. But afterwards they say, “You don’t play this, you don’t play this.” It’s also people that you play funky, but funky then more than that is not, and they come to say, “Oh, you don’t play funky.” Emma Warren Yeah, I’m sure that everybody who plays has had that experience of people trying to pressurize them into playing in a certain direction. One thing I did want to ask you about was a kind of move into production. Around the early ‘80s you starting making records as well. How did that happen? Claudio Rispoli The record in question? They produced me. It was not very good experience. It was good for what we do at home. Then a studio was not very incredible experience because we had to fight [through] the system, on the system of Italy. The producer was the same that takes out a lot of [inaudible]. It was not a great experience, but it was great because from that I understand that I have to run away from that kind of closed stuff. So I start to work for myself and I take first a little 8-track and the first mixer. I start with a little studio. Then I change something every year. And I come big now, I have a board. Very big, 64-channel. All at home, I don’t sell the studio to anyone. This is great. Everything is great if you don’t need to live to eat from the music. Everything. Because it’s something that is very dangerous, you know, because you have to run on yourself. If you need to eat from your work, after some time, you put the shit on the music. [applause] This is nothing great because if you are lucky and you rich, it’s possible you do what you want. If not, you have to run. You have to fight. You have to find the way. If your energy is right, “I think it’s not now, I think it’s not next month, I think it’s not… but next year maybe. Or two years.” And it comes out, anyway. Emma Warren We had an interesting question yesterday. The guy [Lars Bartkuhn] who runs the Needs Not Wants label in Frankfurt was here and was playing a load of records that inspired him plus records he produces himself. Someone asked him, “Can you make a living from music?” And he said, “No, of course I can’t. I have a day job.” For him it was so obvious that he couldn’t make music just from putting out these very beautiful, lovely records and that he needed to do something else. Did you find that production and actually making music was something else for you, that this would allow you to just do music? Claudio Rispoli Yeah, in a way we’re talking about a little... I’m talking about just for fun. Something that in Europe is running, but anyway, we don’t represent anything interesting for a big label company, because the numbers… the [labels] wait for other things. I say, it’s something for a few people, not many. It’s quality. So for the quality you work different. Emma Warren Should we play this, Brazilart? Claudio Rispoli Yeah. It’s very, very old. Emma Warren So this is from when you first started producing music. (music: Moz-Art presents Mysterious Traveller – “Common Destiny” / applause) Claudio Rispoli I am sorry because I remember now, in my car I have one or two tracks from the new one that maybe comes out next year. Because you asked me and I didn’t think of this. I think of just a fun thing. Emma Warren There’s a great percussive middle section to that tune. Claudio Rispoli Yeah. It was a black boy that lived in Rome that played percussion. One of the great conga players around Italy. Emma Warren Was this the kind of thing you were doing with your DJing as well? Claudio Rispoli I play with the records. The difference is there. But also with just funk, we have a section of very, very hard percussion between the sound player but also the percussion player, and the drummer. We are 11, 12 people on stage. Emma Warren I think Davide played some of this when he did a talk on Italian music, but in terms of that whole percussive thing, it would be good to have another quick blast of the “Jingle Masai” to kind of show where you were coming from. (music: Moz-Art - “Jingle Masai”) Emma Warren It’d be interesting to know what were you trying to do when you made that record. What was the music that inspired you to make a tune like that? Claudio Rispoli Not much other things, but the conga, and the way to play the instrument that I love, because the people that improvise on the conga can do something very near to the energy I like. Emma Warren Near to the energy that you’d find in a club, do you mean? Claudio Rispoli Oh, no. Energy that everywhere you are, you can move [gestures around]. Move inside. The club is okay, but you don’t need the dancefloor and the lights for moving inside. The music gives me this in the car, or at home, or anywhere, just a little power. It’s important to eat every day, no? Like eating, don’t stop hearing the music, because I say it’s a great, great thing, may be too much. If you stop hearing the music, some people have more problem with the body. Emma Warren So you’re saying as much as you need to eat every day to stay physically well, you need to listen to the music and keep listening to music. Claudio Rispoli You don’t have to stop listening to music, because it makes you in a good way. The music is very free feeling. Emma Warren What kind of music makes you feel like that now? Claudio Rispoli Every different moment I hear something different. I go home, I want to relax and I put, I don’t know, some jazzy thing, but not standard. I like the contamination. Good things in quality. The best is the DJ with the influence so that the musician… and also something Japanese, for example. Every time is a different moment in music. What is important is that you don’t stop hearing music, because I have four kids. The oldest is 25 years old and the little girl is five years old. One is 25, one is 22, one is 13, and the little one. So you have the possibility to stop hearing music because you have also other problems, but for me it’s so important, and also for them because if I feel good everybody feel good at home. Emma Warren I think after that whole cosmic period finished, you still were very much involved with people from the dance music that was contemporary at the time. You started Jestofunk with CeCe Rogers. Claudio Rispoli I started Jestofunk with two DJs who were friends with me. CeCe Rogers came out when we made the second single, because we made this single with a sample, and this sample was an English singer. We had a problem, of course, because he’s a voice of a people that you put up. We called CeCe because he did some records that we love. It was house music, but we loved the way he’s very near also the old style of music. Emma Warren You’re talking about records like “Someday.” Those are the records that you love to... Claudio Rispoli Exactly, straight. Emma Warren You love that really soulful, American house style that was happening in the late ‘80s, and you called him up specifically. Claudio Rispoli Yeah. Then we find that we are stupid [in] the same [way]. We have a great moment together with CeCe, because CeCe is a young mind, he never stops playing. Also, now we don’t work together, but this summer we do a little tour, like Vienna, two gigs in Switzerland. We had the two new boys, there’s one boy and one girl, black, who sing the whole time. It was great, because now he has a track in Italy that he didn’t do with us. It’s a very easy track that is running on all the radio. Emma Warren CeCe just had a hit in Italy at the moment? Claudio Rispoli Yeah it’s not directly him, he’s a DJ. Disc jockey. [Audience member shouts out the name of the track] Emma Warren What was that? Claudio Rispoli He has a record with this guy and sometimes he comes in Italy because of all the radio play. He called me and we are in concert. Emma Warren In later Jestofunk albums you work with Jocelyn Brown and other singers. Obviously she comes from the disco and soul era. Claudio Rispoli It’s very hard to work like this because you can imagine, Jocelyn Brown, she’s a very big singer, but for her, you know, it’s easy. We make a good thing, but we work [only for] one day. In one day in studio you can do good, but anyway you have to [leave]. I don’t think you can put up the great composition [in one day], but a good song anyway. Emma Warren What about more current Jestofunk stuff? Do you have any other great singers like that? Claudio Rispoli Yeah, the [voice] of Black Uhuru was Freddie McGregor, he’s the Rasta guy. He comes to make a song on the second album and some other. Emma Warren Obviously you’ve had a lot of good people with Jestofunk in the past. What about now? Do you have any plans to bring over new, different singers into the band? Claudio Rispoli Yeah, we are all the time open to new contact. It’s hard to find what we like because seeing that kind of music is not very easy. You need a very big background in school, I think, and maybe for this, the people that comes to sing with us, they are black, you know – because they are in the culture. It’s no problem, if I find [something] I think I like. There’s a lot of people, like Gino Vannelli, for example, that I love. They sing. We are open. Now we have one girl that’s living in Rome that sings with us. Also the track by CeCe Rogers is her track. She sings very good. A black guy, he’s 50 years old, and he comes from rhythm and blues, this stuff. Emma Warren As a band, Jestofunk, you’re still touring and you’re still making records. We haven’t got any Jestofunk tunes to play today, unfortunately. Claudio Rispoli I’m sorry, it’s my fault. Emma Warren No, it’s OK. It’s OK. When can we expect the next release? When will the next Jestofunk music be released? Claudio Rispoli I can’t tell you. I can’t tell you because I finish... I work in the studio for 15 years and the studio has [become] very broken. Very deep and very dirty, because we use the studio like we live, like we sleep, like we eat. I don’t say to my friend, “Don’t smoke.” And after 15 years’ work I have to... [waves arms] Emma Warren You need to clear out. Claudio Rispoli Cut away, clear away all the cable, and I don’t remember how much they were but now I know. I do everything one more time, so now it’s one month [since] I finish and I find I don’t go, just because it’s new and it’s close. I find a good way to go, because there’s long periods to relax. Stop, just hear the music, and don’t produce anything. Also because we’re going around like in August, July, and we have to go now in January. I hope to go in Germany after January. Fast, because I think you can play good that part. Emma Warren So you have the clearout and more music will come. Well, before we wind up it’d be good, because as I mentioned everybody here is kind of a DJ or producer, or they’re running labels, or they’re running clubs or they’re working on the radio – what would be your one single piece of advice? Your best tip that you would pass onto people who are at the very beginnings of their careers in music? Claudio Rispoli Do one more time. Emma Warren I’m waiting for the airplane to go. (Plane noise overhead) My question was, simply, that a lot of the people here are at beginnings of possible or probable careers or lifetimes being involved in music, whether it’s DJing, or running clubs, or making records. What would be the one thing that you would say to people? What would be your best piece of advice? Claudio Rispoli Don’t care. [Applause] Because if you think that there’s something that they don’t give you, you are done. You just take because, I tell you before, if it’s flower, flower comes out. It’s art, maybe you have something to give, maybe not. For making [art], I think you need long time. If not after two days, I don’t know exactly… because the real artist they have to take what is of them after the story is running. You have to fight. You have to live your dimension and it’s not just dream and cake. It’s also a deep thing, bad thing, and you fight yourself like all the people. Maybe an artist has more problems, because you can go deeper. What is important is, don’t care – because if you have something, that something comes out. Claudio Rispoli So you’re saying, if it’s there it’s going to come out and you’ve got to just keep doing it? OK. Well do we have any questions? I’ve got a question over here. Audience Member I want to start my question as maybe a small compliment, because the thing that you were doing with Jestofunk in middle of ’90s is the thing that really got me started on this kind of music. It was called, at that time, acid jazz. Now, lots of people are talking that acid jazz is dead. Some people are saying it has evolved in some other styles in jazz, and you are one of the best bands in this kind of music. What do you think? Is it really dead, or it has evolved? What do you call your music now? Claudio Rispoli Is that the name? Audience Member It’s just a name. Claudio Rispoli Is that the name? It’s like what they do in the football. The music is something that you can close with a name. It’s something you can give at the finish, of course. “Acid jazz” was what a newspaper or what some DJ [said]. For what I think I suggest is a great label company that when you are in Italy you think they go crazy. They make funny. They make good. Then you go in London, you see what it is and you understand that they are very little. Maybe it is dead because now the people that do acid jazz have more works and a new DJ and different… Is Bar Rumba in London, a club like this? Emma Warren Bar Rumba, yes. Yes, yes, yes. That’s still going strong. Claudio Rispoli So I don’t think it’s dead. Emma Warren That’s it. We’re flying the flag. Audience Member What about Bar Rumba? Claudio Rispoli The people that work there was the people that started the label Acid Jazz. Emma Warren It’s Gilles Peterson’s regular Monday night in London. Claudio Rispoli The other guy was ... Help me. Long hair. Emma Warren I can’t remember. It’s Gilles Peterson and someone else [Eddie Piller]. His name’s gone from me as well. Did we have another question over here somewhere? Audience Member What’s the equipment you’re working with? What do you have at home? What is in your studio? Claudio Rispoli I have, I tell you, a board. The mixer is [inaudible], from England. I buy old, old mixers. I think they do in Italy a lot of traditional music on that mixer. I love [inaudible] system, everything. I have the analogue machine, old 16-track on two inches. The machine can run on the older Atari system, because I love it for the MIDI, and on the Macintosh for the Pro Tools. I buy the new 192, the double one, and I have a 16-track digital. On the mixer I have the first 16 of analogue tape, then the second 16 are digital, and then all the MIDI situation. Emma Warren If you were saying to someone a good piece of equipment to start with that’s kind of cheap, it’s accessible, it’s kind of easy to use, what sort of thing would you suggest? Claudio Rispoli I think you can do music and pay nothing now as well. Everything is working. Audience Member Excuse me. You said you’re using tape. Does that mean you’re using reel to reel? You said you’re using old mixers. Claudio Rispoli Old tape? Audience Member Yeah. Claudio Rispoli Have you tried to record the...? Audience Member Yeah, I’ve actually been in a studio with old reel to reel. It’s very difficult. Claudio Rispoli The only way to make a good drum. Audience Member Ah, that’s true. Claudio Rispoli Because if you do the drums in digital, your compression is very [imitates the sound of drums] The analogue machine is particular for that sound gives only air. The compression. It’s very important, the mic. Audience Member What mics are you using in your studio? Claudio Rispoli I can also use cheaper things like the Shure 57, you can put it everywhere. For particular things, the bass drum is important. Audience Member What mics, for example, are you using for the congas or something like that? Claudio Rispoli On congas? Audience Member Yeah. Claudio Rispoli I love the Sennheiser 221. The black old one. The very old one. Audience Member You use a lot of live players in your studio? Is that correct? Claudio Rispoli What? Audience Member Do you have a lot of people playing live instruments in your studio? Claudio Rispoli Not much. Not together anyway. Not together, no. Audience Member You will use a live bass? For example, the drums you probably definitely prefer to record live, no? The bass, for example... Claudio Rispoli Not always. It’s very hard to make the drum. I think if you want to make the drums live in the studio, you need, first, a fucking drummer. This is very important. The people that play very good drums are smiling so much. If you recall, for example, the first record of Elio e le Storie Tese, the first record they did, he was one of the great drummers in Germany and he played in the group Passport for a long time. Nobody knows that the drummer of Elio e le Storie Tese was the drummer of Passport. It’s important [that they are] professional. He comes and he gives you the sound, but the sound is okay. I don’t have a problem to say, “Oh, the bass drum has…” [imitates sound], a very long resonance, you know? Audience Member Yeah, I heard that. That was great. Claudio Rispoli This is a problem that you can find everywhere, so this musician that comes and only thing he’s ready for playing. Audience Member In your new record that’s coming out next year, is there something exciting in there that you’re using that makes it different from the old records you produced before? Claudio Rispoli It’s long time I work with the samples, I tell you. Audience Member I see. What are you sampling? For example, do you source different sounds? Do you have a library of sounds? Claudio Rispoli I can mix also five drums together and take just the fragments that are interesting from each one. It’s possible from one sample I cut all the bass. In the part of the bass I cut the high. Audience Member How much time do you spend making a track? Claudio Rispoli How much? Audience Member Time would you spend making or working? Claudio Rispoli Oh, I don’t care. Audience Member It doesn’t matter. Are you always... Claudio Rispoli To make a good kid, you need nine months. I don’t say it’s the same. [Laughter] I think you have to work. You have to work. I say the first thing that comes… it’s impossible [that] it’s all the time genius. Audience Member How long have you worked on your new album for? Did it take you nine months? Claudio Rispoli I don’t know exactly because I have to change something in my system because the new system has a lot of possibility. The new Pro Tools, the 6.4, is an incredible thing, and maybe you lose time if you go on the sampler because it’s so straight tone and you stretch it easily. You do the stretch on the track like what you understand is the rhythm in question. Usually I do this editing myself and with the Akai. I work a lot with Akai because they have a good filter and it’s a good sampler. Audience Member Which Akai is that? Claudio Rispoli Oh, I have also a very old one. I have also 3S950. I have two 3000, and I have a big 1100 with maximum expansion and all the digital ports. Audience Member I’m so glad that you mentioned the Elio e le Storie Tese. That in my opinion is one of the greatest bands ever that came from Italy. I would like to know how do you feel about the current situation about Italian music? Abroad, Italian music has a big showcase called Festival de Sanremo. Claudio Rispoli I tell to them to do something. [laughs] Audience Member As far as I have seen in the Festival de Sanremo, the real good Italian artists are not represented. They’re not there. Only new artists that come out of nowhere. How do you feel about the current situation in Italian music? What do you think for the future in Italian music? Claudio Rispoli I don’t care. [Laughter] It’s not my problem. My little problem is what they think of us, because Sanremo ran everywhere. I ask myself what they think of us. Because it’s not true, it’s not true that they represent the music of Italy. It’s not true. Anyway, it’s a business you say, no? It’s a business. I think if you go in the States you understand that Italian people that live there represent a big business for a kind of music like... If you don’t know, I tell you, that in Italy they don’t produce music, the big label companies from Italy, they don’t produce music in English. You know what I mean? Anyway, we have a great artist. You know this. Also the great artist, we have [inaudible], who for me was one of the best. There’s no limit. He tried to sing in English and this is a problem. Audience Member They’re great. Claudio Rispoli Yeah, but Elio e le Storie Tese I can’t take seriously, because they don’t want that I take it seriously. They run on what they say. I’m sure that he don’t play to make a musician. He likes to take himself stupid [not seriously]. You have to understand what they say. [Speaks Italian] Audience Member [Replies in Italian] Claudio Rispoli No, no, not exactly. You need to make a long study to understand what he say. Audience Member I know, I know. This is repetitive. Claudio Rispoli You kept talking about [names Italian artist]. Maybe he’s more serious. Audience Member Excuse me please. Could you tell me how are you going to meet your old years? When you are very old, will you still DJ? Claudio Rispoli I think what you see is what I am. My life is running in a way that is impossible to change. I’m not a slave of anything now, like before. It’s normal that some things change and you need to find something that gives you emotion, also for playing yourself, also making it interesting to sing. If not, you don’t go anywhere. But what I am is what I am. What I am in ten years? I don’t know because I don’t ask myself to live so much before. I’m strong. Emma Warren Excellent, so do we have any more questions? We have one here. Audience Member One question. Why do you think nothing changed in the Italian music market between Baia Degli Angeli and now? There is the same situation for the market. Claudio Rispoli No, I am talking about the business. Audience Member Yeah, the business. Like [names Italian artists] and a lot of good guys that are producing good music and it doesn’t come out. The label doesn’t send them to Europe or out of Europe. Claudio Rispoli Now is a problem. Now is a big problem. Now there are not many possibilities. One of the problems comes from things like internet, like this kind of thing. The people that sell the records find another way to take up money. They say, “Oh, we don’t sell any more CDs or records. What do we do?” I tell you exactly what I hear in my stuff, directly. They have the record that is [doing well] in the radio. The problem is, you know, when the Baia was in its big moment, it was not everywhere like this. It was only that that club. In that sense I say nothing changed. Audience Member There was tickets around all Italy. I remember the stickers of Baia Degli Angeli since I was young. I was working in my city and saw in every corner the stickers. It was a very big event in Italy, and everyone knows about [it]. If they’re invested in the right way, they can change, make it popular. Also for the selling of the LPs. They didn’t do it. They didn’t do it in the past, they don’t do now. Why? Claudio Rispoli You’re talking about Baia? No. Nowadays, they don’t know what they have, in the end. They don’t care about this. There’s people that is the same, they have a hotel or... It’s a business, so they don’t care about what was Baia. They care about the way to put 3,000 people inside. Just that. If they ask, “You want to come to make a night?” I say, “Fuck you.” If Daniele say, “There is one big party, one time here.” I say, “I go,” because I don’t care. I feel good and I know that everything is okay. I don’t like so much the people, because it’s not exactly… Emma Warren It’s a tricky situation. I think that might wrap it up unless there’s anything else anyone would like to ask Claudio. In which case we should just say, thank you very much. Claudio Rispoli You’re welcome.