The unmistakable liberating cry of his tenor sax was one of the icons of jazz between the end of the 1960s and the beginning of the following decade, associated first with the furious season of free jazz, then with a personal fusion between jazz and Latin American rhythms. Before then, Leandro “Gato” Barbieri, born in Rosario on November 28, 1934, had wandered in search of his own expressive identity, staying in Italy for a long time. Arriving in Rome in October 1962 together with his wife Michelle, he immediately became the most prominent saxophonist: his is the solo in “Sapore di sale” by Gino Paoli, but above all the Argentine musician became the point of reference for the jazz scene of the capital, in which, among others, the trumpeter Enrico Rava and the pianist Franco D’Andrea act, with whom he regularly plays. Favoured by the lively cultural climate of the time, contacts with the world of cinema were also inevitable: in 1963, thanks to Gianni Amico, Gato Barbieri met Bernardo Bertolucci and was therefore present with two songs (“Walking With G.A” and “Invention for Fabrizio and Gina”) in the soundtrack of Before the Revolution (in the years in which he lived in Italy, Gato Barbieri contributed to several other soundtracks, including those of Una bella grinta by Giuliano Montaldo, with music by Piero Umiliani, and Appunti per un’Orestiade africana by Pasolini). The partnership with Bertolucci was renewed in 1972 with Last Tango in Paris: for the occasion Gato Barbieri wrote a series of themes specifically imbued with sensuality but also with poignant, melancholic poetry. The Argentine saxophonist is in the midst of his Latin phase, started the year before by albums such as Fenix, Under Fire and El Pampero (the last of which was recorded live at the Montreux festival) and later marked by Bolivia, Latin America, Hasta Siempre and Viva Emiliano Zapata. Of the freer Gato Barbieri, memorable are his collaborations with Don Cherry (Complete Communion and Symphony For Improvisers), Giorgio Gaslini (Nuovi Sentimenti), Carla Bley (A Genuine Tong Funeral, Escalator Over The Hill) and with Charlie Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra, in addition to the first albums dedicated to the saxophonist himself, In Search of Mystery and especially The Third World.
