KARACHI: One was expecting that the National Academy of Performing Arts (Napa) students’ presentation of Italian songs and poems on the moon on Thursday evening would be a tad dissimilar from what they were able to pull off in September last year, and they lived up to expectation.

This time round their performance at the concert titled ‘Dedicato alla Luna’ was a notch better primarily because now they are more familiar with the language and its subtle nuances.

Prior to the event, Italian Consul General Gianluca Rubagotti addressed the audience. He said it’s not the same show as put up a few months back; it’s different because it had more instruments and singers. He said he had a special treat for the audience because there was amongst them the Italian wildlife painter Maurizio Boscheri and his curator Mario Liberali who would be reading poems in Italian during the show.

The first song that the students performed was ‘Luna’, with Nigel as the lead singer. Nigel sang it with the right spirit, although one felt that the sound of the keyboard drowned out the chorus. The technical glitch improved later on. Next up was ‘Luna perte’ sung by Shehzad. It was a nice effort. Shehzad is a good singer and has decent control over his voice. Perhaps the only thing he needs to do is to loosen up a bit while performing.

The students then sang ‘Spunta la luna dal monte’ which was very well received. It was followed by ‘Guarda che luna’ with Chao leading the ensemble. But the highlight of the gig was ‘Lacrime dalla luna’ sung by Joel. It was such a delight to hear a young man hitting the high notes with effortless ease. And he did that with great gusto.

Then came an Urdu track ‘Chhu lia dharti ne aasman’. The concert returned to Italian songs with ‘Mare luna’ performed in the lead by Nigel. It had a gentle, melancholic feel to it, well conveyed by the singer. The event was rounded off with a couple of songs performed by the chorus.

As mentioned earlier, in between the tracks Maurizio Boscheri and Mario Liberali read out poems in Italian and their Urdu translation was recited by Haroon. The titles of the poems in Urdu were: ‘Chand to chand hai’, ‘Chand ka aakhri rukh’ and ‘Chand ke naam’.

The event was organised by the Italian consulate and Napa.

Published in Dawn, January 6th, 2017