Augurium
Scene II from The Shaman, Heretical Story of Francis of Assisi
It is winter and Francis of Assisi walks along a frozen stream. The water, which once flowed and let its voice be heard, now falls silent, imprisoned in icy crystals. It is like a word on the page, like an image in a monk’s miniature: everything that crystallizes the vital breath, the mystery of the whole, freezes it, depriving it of freedom and movement.
This is what memory is like when it becomes dogma: beautiful, but motionless. This is what the image of Francis of Assisi becomes, when it is fixed forever in official memory. But the unpredictable shaman, who knows how to speak with animals, is not a harmless icon, not an obedient saint. Truth does not allow itself to be imprisoned.
The clarinet plays and laughs among the shadows. The lute and the theorbo evoke a mysterious dream. The tanpura vibrates underneath, like a call from the East.
Francis, the shaman of Assisi, watches the birds, his guide animals, and knows how to read their flight. Their migration is a dance, it is a laughter that crosses history and carries you into the wind, where you are transformed into a melody that intertwines and blends with other melodies.
This piece is the second scene from The Shaman: A Heretical Story of Francis of Assisi, a poetic and musical work that tells the life of the (not yet) saint as an initiatory journey between the worlds of the visible and the invisible.
Lyrics
Here is a possible English translation of the text for this piece. It is as faithful as possible; however, the full semantic nuances and layers of meaning in a poetic text like this cannot be fully rendered in translation. The complete text will be available in Italian in the book + CD Lo Sciamano. Storia eretica di Francesco d’Assisi, to be released later in 2026.
«The sound of water is the clear voice
of light nymphs, enchanted and lost
in the winding rills of the stream,
a living secret in the belly of the wood.
Vibrant wind, shifting embroidery,
cold shiver, night has frozen you
as the monk in the miniature
freezes the unimaginable breath.
You, crystal of motionless paths,
gentle writing of shining inlay,
are the mute portrait of that voice.
But still sing perishable leaves
and of centuries within centuries laughs
the sky in the sublime flight of birds.»
Crediti
Voice of Francis of Assisi: Alessandro Ciacci.
Clarinet: Alessio Zanovello.
Tanpura: Mauro Bove.
Lute and Theorbo: Luciano Bernardi.
Synthesizers: Carlo Matti.
Production, Mix e Mastering: Carlo Matti.