Daniele Baldelli presents
BAIA DEGLI ANGELI 1977-1978
NEW BOOK/CD
The Legendary Italian Discoteque of the 70's
01) RHYTHM MAKERS ¿ zone (K.Crier-K.Banks-R.LeBlanc)
02) JOHN FORDE - don¿t you know who did it (John Forde)
03) BOMBERS - don¿t stop the music (Kurt Hauenstein)
04) TONY SILVESTER & THE NEW INGREDIENT - pazuzu (Patrick Adams)
05) CERRONE - take me ¿ ( cerrone / wisniak )
06) ANDRE GAGNON - surprise (Andre Gagnon )
07) FLASHBACK-ROGER GRAVEL - un habit en la bemol ¿ (Roger Gravel)
08) ARPADYS ¿ monkey star ( Sauveur Mallia ¿ Pierre-Alain Dahan )
09) NEEDA ¿ come on and rock ¿ (W.Moore-J.Holloway-J.Johnson)
10) GORDON¿S WAR ¿ the rock is gonna get you ¿ (J.R.Bailey)
11) CHAIN REACTION ¿ sweet lady ¿ (Austin Nixon)
12) BLACK DEVIL ¿ "H" friend (Joachim Sherylee ¿ Junior Claristidge)
13) VOYAGE ¿ point zero ¿ (Chantraeu / Dahan / Pezin)
14) DON RAY ¿ midnight madness ¿ (don ray / cerrone )
15) BLACK DEVIL ¿ timing,forget the timing (Joachim Sherylee ¿ Junior Claristidge)
16) FIVE LETTERS ¿ magnifico mambo (D.Desrouvres-CL.Vallois)
Compiled by Daniele Baldelli
Project coordination by Duba
Remember (forever) Baia Degli Angeli.
The Baia Degli Angeli. It¿s not exaggerate to say everything started there.
The golden age of disco, clubbing, glamour: just everything. I¿m not saying ¿discoteques¿ were a novelty (although in Italy were still called nightclubs, or ¿balere¿). There was the Piper, in 1965, which instilled a little bit of ¿swingin¿ London inside the ancient walls of the ¿the eternal city¿, Roma. There was the Altro Mondo Studios, built up as a kind of spaceship or galactic island, which in ¿67 was making believe young riminesi (not only them, anyways) that Future with capital ¿F¿, the one of Urania and the first sci-fi tv series, was just a question of weeks, or a couple of months at the most. But from the start the Baia was another story. Another world, too. It started in1974, on the edge of the still big ¿68 revolutionary excitement and also on the grandeur of his creator, Giancarlo Tirotti, a little local tycoon, well introduced in roman cinema¿s jet-set and a taste and elegance definitely ¿international¿ and - for those days - absolutely new. Let¿s say it once for all: the New York¿s Studio 54 hasn¿t invented anything.
Mixing ¿stars¿ and normal people in a beautiful place, in a way that simply ¿being there¿ was already an experience, it was a bright intuition of Tirotti three years in advance of Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager.
At the Baia you could meet Hollywood¿s movie stars transiting in Italy,
and by the way - before the conversion into disco, it was a sporting-club for the rich - with those totally white walls, the indoor and outdoor pools, the terrace where one could get a breathtaking view of Gabicce, it looked just like a Californian resort. Music - another news - was loud, really loud, and there was no rule of ¿three slows & three shakes¿, something still in vigour in all the other clubs. And it was open till 6 a.m., you could watch the dawn at the Baia... listening to the new Philly Sound, played by Bob Day and Tom Sison the two dj¿s Tirotti brought from New York. Punctually, all the other djs from Rimini and Riccione would come at the Baia to listen what Bob & Tom were doing, and it was always a shock! Firstly for the records, which both of them were getting right from USA, and the tecnique, too... In those days, putting a piece of paper between the record and the turntable, in order to get a faster start and a better mixing, was just a revolutionary strike... The day Bob & Tom decided to go back to America, they themselves - like a Star Wars saga - had to designate a substitute for the Baia¿s consolle.
It is 1977, and the chosen one is a young local dj already well known to the nightflies of the italian East Coast: Daniele Baldelli.
In the meantime discomusic was spreading everywhere in Italy. The Baia - like a Fiorucci¿s dream come true - displays plexiglass dancefloors and a crazy dj-booth inside a lift that goes up and down all the night long... the people is dancing on the 4 floors, look around and feel like being in a very ¿transgressive¿ tv show, like the famous Strix on sunday nights. Rivers of champagne and a lot of very suspicious little powders are flowing... Actors, intellectuals and starlets of the little screen are usual presence on the dance floors and sofas.
Grace Jones is so often a guest to become practically part of the environment.
How beautiful was the Baia! Always completely white. Not a minute wrong detail, nor a hint of bad taste to ruin the elegant skyline. Only light, bright light... A battery of lights effects on a mechanical arm was moving
and spreading around very sexy showers of lights and shadows. The little neon-light angel, sort of good-luck symbol who became the Baia¿s logo and occasionally some exploit a-la-Warhol (like the Marylin Monroe¿s icon deliriously librated in the air with stripes & ballons). The ¿golden age¿ of the Baia Degli Angeli lasted only two seasons. In ¿78, after repeated breaks by the Police is the definitive closing. Too much fuss, too much intimidations from the sleepy establishment of the adriatic riviera. Too many ¿joyous powders¿, for the Authority.
A press document of the time (just a laughing matter today) states that the Baia «with is mere existence is promoting drugs between young people».
The little air-balloon who gave birth to the glittering dream of the Baia was finally blown up... and the legend begins. And, as always goes when legends are born (think about NewYork¿s Loft or Paradise Garage, or Chicago¿s Warehouse), everybody started saying «I¿ve been there», when actually just very few people stepped at the Baia, and danced to the music of Baldelli and his associate, the ¿generous¿ Claudio ¿Mozart¿ Rispoli.
Those were other days... days were one wasn¿t trotting up and down Italy with the same easyness of today: but if the wheels of the 128¿s and the 500¿s would not reach everywhere, the ¿mixtapes¿ with the recordings of those legendary nights would. The popping out of a ¿mixtape¿ from the Baia Degli Angeli in a provincial italian city was an event able to change the course of History. A lot of dj¿s (today superstars) , one name for all: Claudio Coccoluto, have seen the Light listening to the ¿mixtapes¿ of Baldelli & Mozart, which were just doing incredible
things back then, mixing Kraftwerk, War & Jean Luc Ponty, with the smooth and comfort of someone who understood that music is a big treasure box from where one can track down shining gems. The Baia is the place who gave birth to the italian ¿dj culture¿, and where ¿garage¿ was invented, three years in advance from the Paradise Garage and ¿ambient¿ ten years before ambient, mixing styles and genres with the absolutely open ¿attitude¿ that Baldelli would bring out as a real trade mark of his own, starting from the
subsequent adventure of the ¿Cosmic¿, on the lake of Garda, the place where the so-called ¿afro¿ phenomenon was born.
But that¿s another story...
Fabio De Luca, june 2005.
...Artists such as: Arthur Conley, Joe Tex, Wilson Pickett, James Brown, Rufus Thomas, Lyn Collins ... Getting this material was not always so easy.
Usually the DJ would go to the same and only little musical store in his own town. Daniele Baldelli, instead would get on a train and run to Lugano (there was a store there called Radio Columbia) and sometimes would go to Paris where he could find imported albums. Another particularity of the disco nights in the 70's was that the fast music that you would dance to like "shake" would be alternated to slow songs. It was usually five shakes and five slows, then as the years went on it would be 30 minutes of shake and then slows.
In 1974-75 the Baia Degli Angeli opens. this starts the history of disco's in Italy. Situated on the hills of Gabicce (Pesaro), looking over the sea, it had different floors all connected between them. it was totally white with a breathtaking view, the console of the DJ was made from a lift with glass walls that gave the possibility to go from the first to the second floor and have a complete view of the dance floors both inside and out. Plus there was a mechanical arm with all the light effects that could move on all the different dance floors as well. there was an indoor and outdoor pool (with dance floor), avantgarde graphics, amazing closing hours (5 or 6 am) and
no ¿slows¿, just great american music never heard before.
The music selection was by two american dee-jays: Tom Sison and Bob Day.
They all had mixers-earphones-listening monitors, but probably no one knew the best ways to use them.
The fact that Daniele Baldelli was living so close to the Baia degli Angeli surely
gave a good influence on his technical evolution. he saw for the first time, from the two americans how to make an actual mix. You would take off the rubber covering the plate and put on it a 45 with it's paper cover and on this you would put the album and spin it. this way you could slow or increase with your hands the speed of the
record and have a perfect mix. it was a great surprise and happiness for Daniele Baldelli
when bob and Tom spotted him at the TABU CLUB one afternoon and made him great compliments. they later suggested him to the baia¿s owners as a good substitute
at the end of their contract, leaving him a copy he so
much longed for of LOLEATTA HOLLOWAY¿s ¿hit and run¿ with their autograph on it !!!
just around the same time Claudio Rispoli (a.k.a. MOZART) was hired. They worked together in this great adventure from 1977 to 78'...
The rest is history .......
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